1 <html><head><meta http-equiv=
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"Om forfatteren Lawrense Lessig (http://www.lessig.org), professor i juss og en John A. Wilson Distinguished Faculty Scholar ved Stanford Law School, er stifteren av Stanford Center for Internet and Society og styreleder i Creative Commons (http://creativecommons.org). Forfatteren har gitt ut The Future of Ideas (Random House, 2001) og Code: And other Laws of Cyberspace (Basic Books, 1999), og er medlem av styrene i Public Library of Science, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, og Public Knowledge. Han har vunnet Free Software Foundation's Award for the Advancement of Free Software, to ganger vært oppført i BusinessWeek's "e.biz 25," og omtalt som en av Scientific American's "50 visjonærer". Etter utdanning ved University of Pennsylvania, Cambridge University, og Yale Law School, assisterte Lessig dommer Richard Posner ved U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals."></head><body bgcolor=
"white" text=
"black" link=
"#0000FF" vlink=
"#840084" alink=
"#0000FF"><div lang=
"nb" class=
"book" title=
"Fri kultur"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h1 class=
"title"><a name=
"index"></a>Fri kultur
</h1></div><div><h2 class=
"subtitle">Hvordan store mediaaktører bruker teknologi og loven til å låse ned kulturen
2 og kontrollere kreativiteten
</h2></div><div><div class=
"authorgroup"><div class=
"author"><h3 class=
"author"><span class=
"firstname">Lawrence
</span> <span class=
"surname">Lessig
</span></h3></div></div></div><div><p class=
"releaseinfo">Versjon
2004-
02-
10</p></div><div><p class=
"copyright">Opphavsrett ©
2004 Lawrence Lessig
</p></div><div><div class=
"legalnotice" title=
"Rettslig merknad"><a name=
"id2912013"></a><p>
3 Denne versjonen av
<em class=
"citetitle">Fri Kultur
</em> er lisensert med en
4 Creative Commons-lisens. Denne lisensen tillater ikke-kommersiell
5 utnyttelse av verket, hvis opphavsinnehaveren er navngitt. For mer
6 informasjon om lisensen, klikk på ikonet over eller besøk
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/1.0/" target=
"_top">http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/
1.0/
</a>
7 </p></div></div><div><p class=
"pubdate">2004-
03-
25</p></div><div><div class=
"abstract" title=
"Om forfatteren"><p class=
"title"><b>Om forfatteren
</b></p><p>
8 Lawrense Lessig (
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://www.lessig.org/" target=
"_top">http://www.lessig.org
</a>), professor i
9 juss og en John A. Wilson Distinguished Faculty Scholar ved Stanford Law
10 School, er stifteren av Stanford Center for Internet and Society og
11 styreleder i Creative Commons (
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://creativecommons.org/" target=
"_top">http://creativecommons.org
</a>).
12 Forfatteren har gitt ut The Future of Ideas (Random House,
2001) og Code:
13 And other Laws of Cyberspace (Basic Books,
1999), og er medlem av styrene i
14 Public Library of Science, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, og Public
15 Knowledge. Han har vunnet Free Software Foundation's Award for the
16 Advancement of Free Software, to ganger vært oppført i BusinessWeek's "e.biz
17 25," og omtalt som en av Scientific American's "
50 visjonærer". Etter
18 utdanning ved University of Pennsylvania, Cambridge University, og Yale Law
19 School, assisterte Lessig dommer Richard Posner ved U.S. Seventh Circuit
21 </p></div></div></div><hr></div><div class=
"dedication" title=
"Dedikasjon"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"id2892558"></a>Dedikasjon
</h2></div></div></div><p>
22 Til Eric Eldred
— hvis arbeid først trakk meg til denne saken, og for
23 hvem saken fortsetter.
25 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"CreativeCommons"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
1. Creative Commons, noen rettigheter reservert
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/cc.png" alt=
"Creative Commons, noen rettigheter reservert"></div></div></div><p><br class=
"figure-break">
26 </p></div><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"preface"><a href=
"#preface">Forord
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#c-introduction">1. Introduksjon
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"part"><a href=
"#c-piracy">I. "Piratvirksomhet"
</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#creators">2. Kapittel en: Skaperne
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#mere-copyists">3. Kapittel to:
"Kun etter-apere"</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#catalogs">4. Kapittel tre: Kataloger
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#pirates">5. Kapittel fire:
"Pirater"</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#film">Film
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#recordedmusic">Innspilt musikk
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#radio">Radio
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#cabletv">Kabel-TV
</a></span></dt></dl></dd><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#piracy">6. Kapittel fem:
"Piratvirksomhet"</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#piracy-i">Piracy I
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#piracy-ii">Piracy II
</a></span></dt></dl></dd></dl></dd><dt><span class=
"part"><a href=
"#c-property">II. "Eiendom"
</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#founders">7. Kapittel seks: Grunnleggerne
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#recorders">8. Kapittel sju: Innspillerne
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#transformers">9. Kapittel åtte: Omformere
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#collectors">10. Kapittel ni: Samlere
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#property-i">11. Kapittel ti:
"Eiendom"</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#hollywood">Hvorfor Hollywood har rett
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#beginnings">Opphav
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawduration">Loven: Varighet
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawscope">Loven: Virkeområde
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawreach">Lov og arkitektur: Rekkevidde
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawforce">Arkitektur og lov: Makt
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#marketconcentration">Marked: Konsentrasjon
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#together">Sammen
</a></span></dt></dl></dd></dl></dd><dt><span class=
"part"><a href=
"#c-puzzles">III. Nøtter
</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#chimera">12. Kapittel elleve: Chimera
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#harms">13. Kapittel tolv: Skader
</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#constrain">Constraining Creators
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#innovators">Constraining Innovators
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#corruptingcitizens">Corrupting Citizens
</a></span></dt></dl></dd></dl></dd><dt><span class=
"part"><a href=
"#c-balances">IV. Maktfordeling
</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#eldred">14. Kapittel tretten: Eldred
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#eldred-ii">15. Kapittel fjorten: Eldred II
</a></span></dt></dl></dd><dt><span class=
"part"><a href=
"#c-conclusion">V. Konklusjon
</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#id2967321">16.
</a></span></dt></dl></dd><dt><span class=
"part"><a href=
"#c-afterword">VI. Etterord
</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#id2969690">17.
</a></span></dt></dl></dd><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#c-notes">18. Notater
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#c-acknowledgments">19. Takk til
</a></span></dt></dl></div><div class=
"list-of-figures"><p><b>Figuroversikt
</b></p><dl><dt>1.
<a href=
"#CreativeCommons">Creative Commons, noen rettigheter reservert
</a></dt><dt>11.1.
<a href=
"#fig-1331">How four different modalities of regulation interact to support or weaken
27 the right or regulation.
</a></dt><dt>11.2.
<a href=
"#fig-1361">Law has a special role in affecting the three.
</a></dt><dt>11.3.
<a href=
"#fig-1371">Copyright's regulation before the Internet.
</a></dt><dt>11.4.
<a href=
"#fig-1381">effective state of anarchy after the Internet.
</a></dt><dt>11.5.
<a href=
"#fig-1441">Copyright's regulation before the Internet.
</a></dt><dt>11.6.
<a href=
"#fig-1442">"Opphavsrett" i dag.
</a></dt><dt>11.7.
<a href=
"#fig-1521">Alle potensielle bruk av en bok.
</a></dt><dt>11.8.
<a href=
"#fig-1531">Eksempler på uregulert bruk av en bok.
</a></dt><dt>11.9.
<a href=
"#fig-1541">Republishing stands at the core of this circle of possible uses of a
28 copyrighted work.
</a></dt><dt>11.10.
<a href=
"#fig-1542">Uregulert kopiering anses som "rimelig bruk".
</a></dt><dt>11.11.
<a href=
"#fig-1551">Uses that before were presumptively unregulated are now presumptively
29 regulated.
</a></dt><dt>11.12.
<a href=
"#fig-1611">Bilde av en gammel versjon av Adobe eBook Reader.
</a></dt><dt>11.13.
<a href=
"#fig-1612">List of the permissions that the publisher purports to grant.
</a></dt><dt>11.14.
<a href=
"#fig-1621">E-book of Aristotle;s "Politics"
</a></dt><dt>11.15.
<a href=
"#fig-1622">Liste med tillatelser for Aristotles "Politics".
</a></dt><dt>11.16.
<a href=
"#fig-1631">List of the permissions for "The Future of Ideas".
</a></dt><dt>11.17.
<a href=
"#fig-1641">List of the permissions for "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland".
</a></dt><dt>11.18.
<a href=
"#fig-1711">VCR/handgun cartoon.
</a></dt><dt>11.19.
<a href=
"#fig-1761">Mønster for moderne mediaeierskap.
</a></dt></dl></div><div class=
"list-of-tables"><p><b>tabelloversikt
</b></p><dl><dt>6.1.
<a href=
"#t1">Tabell
</a></dt><dt>11.1.
<a href=
"#t2"></a></dt><dt>11.2.
<a href=
"#t3"></a></dt><dt>11.3.
<a href=
"#t4"></a></dt><dt>11.4.
<a href=
"#t5"></a></dt></dl></div><div class=
"colophon" title=
"Kolofon"><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"id2926314"></a>Kolofon
</h2><p>
30 Du kan kjøpe en kopi av denne boken ved å klikke på en av lenkene nedenfor:
31 </p><div class=
"itemizedlist"><ul class=
"itemizedlist" type=
"number" compact
><li class=
"listitem" style=
"list-style-type: number"><p><a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://www.amazon.com/" target=
"_top">Amazon
</a></p></li><li class=
"listitem" style=
"list-style-type: number"><p><a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://www.barnesandnoble.com/" target=
"_top">B
&N
</a></p></li><li class=
"listitem" style=
"list-style-type: number"><p><a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://www.penguin.com/" target=
"_top">Penguin
</a></p></li></ul></div><p>
32 Andre bøker av Lawrence Lessig
34 The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World
36 Code: And Other Laws of Cyberspace
38 The Penguin Press, New York
42 Hvordan store mediaaktører bruker teknologi og loven til å låse ned kulturen
43 og kontrollere kreativiteten
47 THE PENGUIN PRESS, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
375 Hudson Street
50 Opphavsrettbeskyttet © Lawrence Lessig. Alle rettigheter reservert.
52 Excerpt from an editorial titled "The Coming of Copyright Perpetuity,"
53 <em class=
"citetitle">The New York Times
</em>, January
16,
2003. Copyright
54 ©
2003 by The New York Times Co. Reprinted with permission.
56 Cartoon in
<a class=
"xref" href=
"#fig-1711" title=
"Figur 11.18. VCR/handgun cartoon.">Figur
11.18,
“VCR/handgun cartoon.
”</a> by Paul Conrad, copyright Tribune
57 Media Services, Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.
59 Diagram in
<a class=
"xref" href=
"#fig-1761" title=
"Figur 11.19. Mønster for moderne mediaeierskap.">Figur
11.19,
“Mønster for moderne mediaeierskap.
”</a> courtesy of the office of FCC
60 Commissioner, Michael J. Copps.
62 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
64 Lessig, Lawrence. Free culture : how big media uses technology and the law
65 to lock down culture and control creativity / Lawrence Lessig.
71 ISBN
1-
59420-
006-
8 (hardcover)
73 1. Intellectual property
—United States.
2. Mass media
—United
76 3. Technological innovations
—United States.
4. Art
—United
83 This book is printed on acid-free paper.
85 Printed in the United States of America
89 Designed by Marysarah Quinn
91 Oversatt til bokmål av Petter Reinholdtsen og Anders Hagen
92 Jarmund. Kildefilene til oversetterprosjektet er
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig" target=
"_top">tilgjengelig
93 fra github
</a>. Rapporter feil med oversettelsen via github.
95 Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this
96 publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval
97 system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical,
98 photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission
99 of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book. The
100 scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via
101 any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and
102 punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and
103 do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted
104 materials. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated.
105 </p></div><div class=
"preface" title=
"Forord"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"preface"></a>Forord
</h2></div></div></div><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxpoguedavid"></a><p>
106 David Pogue, en glimrende skribent og forfatter av utallige tekniske
107 datarelaterte tekster, skrev dette på slutten av hans gjennomgang av min
108 første bok,
<em class=
"citetitle">Code: And Other Laws of Cyberspace
</em>:
109 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
110 I motsetning til faktiske lover, så har ikke internett-programvare
111 kapasiteten til å straffe. Den påvirker ikke folk som ikke er online (og
112 kun en veldig liten minoritet av verdens befolkning er online). Og hvis du
113 ikke liker systemet på internett, så kan du alltid slå av
114 modemet.
<sup>[
<a name=
"preface01" href=
"#ftn.preface01" class=
"footnote">1</a>]
</sup>
115 </p></blockquote></div><p>
116 Pogue var skeptisk til argumentet som er kjernen av boken
— at
117 programvaren, eller "koden", fungerte som en slags lov
— og foreslo i
118 sin anmeldelse den lykkelig tanken at hvis livet i cyberspace gikk dårlig,
119 så kan vi alltid som med en trylleformel slå over en bryter og komme hjem
120 igjen. Slå av modemet, koble fra datamaskinen, og eventuelle problemer som
121 finnes
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>den
</em></span> virkeligheten ville ikke "påvirke" oss mer.
124 Pogue kan ha hatt rett i
1999 — jeg er skeptisk, men det kan
125 hende. Men selv om han hadde rett da, så er ikke argumentet gyldig
126 nå.
<em class=
"citetitle">Fri Kultur
</em> er om problemene internett forårsaker
127 selv etter at modemet er slått av. Den er et argument om hvordan slagene
128 som nå brer om seg i livet on-line har fundamentalt påvirket "folk som er
129 ikke pålogget." Det finnes ingen bryter som kan isolere oss fra
131 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2892669"></a><p>
132 Men i motsetning til i boken
<em class=
"citetitle">Code
</em>, er argumentet her
133 ikke så mye om internett i seg selv. Istedet er det om konsekvensen av
134 internett for en del av vår tradisjon som er mye mer grunnleggende, og
135 uansett hvor hardt dette er for en geek-wanna-be å innrømme, mye viktigere.
137 Den tradisjonen er måten vår kultur blir laget på. Som jeg vil forklare i
138 sidene som følger, kommer vi fra en tradisjon av "fri kultur"
—ikke
139 "fri" som i "fri bar" (for å låne et uttrykk fra stifteren av fri
140 programvarebevegelsen
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2892650" href=
"#ftn.id2892650" class=
"footnote">2</a>]
</sup>), men "fri" som i
141 "talefrihet", "fritt marked", "frihandel", "fri konkurranse", "fri vilje" og
142 "frie valg". En fri kultur støtter og beskytter skapere og oppfinnere.
143 Dette gjør den direkte ved å tildele immaterielle rettigheter. Men det gjør
144 den indirekte ved å begrense rekkevidden for disse rettighetene, for å
145 garantere at neste generasjon skapere og oppfinnere forblir
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>så fri
146 som mulig
</em></span> fra kontroll fra fortiden. En fri kultur er ikke en
147 kultur uten eierskap, like lite som et fritt marked er et marked der alt er
148 gratis. Det motsatte av fri kultur er "tillatelseskultur"
—en kultur
149 der skapere kun kan skape med tillatelse fra de mektige, eller fra skaperne
152 Hvis vi forsto denne endringen, så tror jeg vi ville stå imot den. Ikke
153 "vi" på venstresiden eller "dere" på høyresiden, men vi som ikke har
154 investert i den bestemt kulturindustrien som har definert det tjuende
155 århundre. Enten du er på venstre eller høyresiden, hvis du i denne forstand
156 ikke har interesser, vil historien jeg forteller her gi deg problemer. For
157 endringene jeg beskriver påvirker verdier som begge sider av vår politiske
158 kultur anser som grunnleggende.
159 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2892702"></a><p>
160 Vi så et glimt av dette tverrpolitiske raseri på forsommeren i
2003. Da FCC
161 vurderte endringer i reglene for medieeierskap som ville slakke på
162 begrensningene rundt mediakonsentrasjon, sendte en ekstraordinær koalisjon
163 mer enn
700 000 brev til FCC for å motsette seg endringen. Mens William
164 Safire beskrev å marsjere "ubehagelig sammen med CodePink Women for Peace
165 and the National Rifle Association, mellom liberale Olympia Snowe og
166 konservative Ted Stevens", formulerte han kanskje det enkleste uttrykket
167 for hva som var på spill: konsentrasjonen av makt. Så spurte han:
168 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2893474"></a>
169 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
170 Høres dette ikke-konservativt ut? Ikke for meg. Denne konsentrasjonen av
171 makt
—politisk, selskapsmessig, pressemessig, kulturelt
—bør være
172 bannlyst av konservative. Spredningen av makt gjennom lokal kontroll, og
173 derigjennom oppmuntre til individuell deltagelse, er essensen i føderalismen
174 og det største uttrykk for demokrati.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2893497" href=
"#ftn.id2893497" class=
"footnote">3</a>]
</sup>
175 </p></blockquote></div><p>
176 Denne idéen er et element i argumentet til
<em class=
"citetitle">Fri
177 Kultur
</em>, selv om min fokus ikke bare er på konsentrasjonen av
178 makt som følger av konsentrasjonen i eierskap, men mer viktig, og fordi det
179 er mindre synlig, på konsentrasjonen av makt som er resultat av en radikal
180 endring i det effektive virkeområdet til loven. Loven er i endring, og
181 endringen forandrer på hvordan vår kultur blir skapt. Den endringen bør
182 bekymre deg
—Uansett om du bryr deg om internett eller ikke, og uansett
183 om du er til venstre for Safires eller til høyre. Inspirasjonen til tittelen
184 og mye av argumentet i denne boken kommer fra arbeidet til Richard Stallman
185 og Free Software Foundation. Faktisk, da jeg leste Stallmans egne tekster på
186 nytt, spesielt essyene i
<em class=
"citetitle">Free Software, Free Society
</em>,
187 innser jeg at alle de teoretiske innsiktene jeg utvikler her er innsikter
188 som Stallman beskrev for tiår siden. Man kan dermed godt argumentere for at
189 dette verket kun er et avledet verk.
192 Jeg godtar kritikken, hvis det faktisk er kritikk. Arbeidet til en advokat
193 er alltid avledede verker, og jeg mener ikke å gjøre noe mer i denne boken
194 enn å minne en kultur om en tradisjon som alltid har vært deres egen. Som
195 Stallman forsvarer jeg denne tradisjonen på grunnlag av verdier. Som
196 Stallman tror jeg dette er verdiene til frihet. Og som Stallman, tror jeg
197 dette er verdier fra vår fortid som må forsvares i vår fremtid. En fri
198 kultur har vært vår fortid, men vil bare være vår fremtid hvis vi endrer
199 retningen vi følger akkurat nå. På samme måte som Stallmans argumenter for
200 fri programvare, treffer argumenter for en fri kultur på forvirring som er
201 vanskelig å unngå, og enda vanskeligere å forstå. En fri kultur er ikke en
202 kultur uten eierskap. Det er ikke en kultur der kunstnere ikke får
203 betalt. En kultur uten eierskap eller en der skaperne ikke kan få betalt, er
204 anarki, ikke frihet. Anarki er ikke hva jeg fremmer her.
206 I stedet er den frie kulturen som jeg forsvarer i denne boken en balanse
207 mellom anarki og kontroll. En fri kultur, i likhet med et fritt marked, er
208 fylt med eierskap. Den er fylt med regler for eierskap og kontrakter som
209 blir håndhevet av staten. Men på samme måte som det frie markedet blir
210 pervertert hvis dets eierskap blir føydalt, så kan en fri kultur bli ødelagt
211 av ekstremisme i eierskapsrettighetene som definerer den. Det er dette jeg
212 frykter om vår kultur i dag. Det er som motpol til denne ekstremismen at
213 denne boken er skrevet.
214 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.preface01" href=
"#preface01" class=
"para">1</a>]
</sup>
215 David Pogue, "Don't Just Chat, Do Something,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New York
216 Times
</em>,
30. januar
2000
217 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2892650" href=
"#id2892650" class=
"para">2</a>]
</sup>
218 Richard M. Stallman,
<em class=
"citetitle">Fri programvare, Frie samfunn
</em> 57
219 (Joshua Gay, red.
2002).
220 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2893497" href=
"#id2893497" class=
"para">3</a>]
</sup> William Safire, "The Great Media Gulp,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New York
221 Times
</em>,
22. mai
2003.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2893504"></a>
222 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 1. Introduksjon"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"c-introduction"></a>Kapittel
1. Introduksjon
</h2></div></div></div><p>
223 17. desember
1903, på en vindfylt strand i Nord-Carolina i såvidt under
224 hundre sekunder, demonstrerte Wright-brødrene at et selvdrevet fartøy tyngre
225 enn luft kunne fly. Øyeblikket var elektrisk, og dens betydning ble alment
226 forstått. Nesten umiddelbart, eksploderte interessen for denne nye
227 teknologien som muliggjorde bemannet luftfart og en hærskare av oppfinnere
228 begynte å bygge videre på den.
230 Da Wright-brødrene fant opp flymaskinen, hevdet loven i USA at en grunneier
231 ble antatt å eie ikke bare overflaten på området sitt, men også alt landet
232 under bakken, helt ned til senterpunktet i jorda, og alt volumet over
233 bakken, "i ubestemt grad, oppover".
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2893660" href=
"#ftn.id2893660" class=
"footnote">4</a>]
</sup> I
234 mange år undret lærde over hvordan en best skulle tolke idéen om at
235 eiendomsretten gikk helt til himmelen. Betød dette at du eide stjernene?
236 Kunne en dømme gjess for at de regelmessig og med vilje tok seg inn på annen
239 Så kom flymaskiner, og for første gang hadde dette prinsippet i lovverket i
240 USA
—dypt nede i grunnlaget for vår tradisjon og akseptert av de
241 viktigste juridiske tenkerne i vår fortid
—en betydning. Hvis min
242 eiendom rekker til himmelen, hva skjer når United flyr over mitt område?
243 Har jeg rett til å nekte dem å bruke min eiendom? Har jeg mulighet til å
244 inngå en eksklusiv avtale med Delta Airlines? Kan vi gjennomføre en auksjon
245 for å finne ut hvor mye disse rettighetene er verdt?
246 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2893680"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2893705"></a><p>
247 I
1945 ble disse spørsmålene en føderal sak. Da bøndene Thomas Lee og Tinie
248 Causby i Nord Carolina begynte å miste kyllinger på grunn av lavtflygende
249 militære fly (vettskremte kyllinger fløy tilsynelatende i låveveggene og
250 døde), saksøkte Causbyene regjeringen for å trenge seg inn på deres
251 eiendom. Flyene rørte selvfølgelig aldri overflaten på Causbys' eiendom. Men
252 hvis det stemte som Blackstone, Kent, og Cola hadde sagt, at deres eiendom
253 strakk seg "i ubestemt grad, oppover," så hadde regjeringen trengt seg inn
254 på deres eiendom, og Causbys ønsket å sette en stopper for dette.
255 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2893725"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2893732"></a><p>
256 Høyesterett gikk med på å ta opp Causbys sak. Kongressen hadde vedtatt at
257 luftfartsveiene var tilgjengelig for alle, men hvis ens eiendom virkelig
258 rakk til himmelen, da kunne muligens kongressens vedtak ha vært i strid med
259 grunnlovens forbud mot å "ta" eiendom uten kompensasjon. Retten erkjente at
260 "det er gammel doktrine etter sedvane at en eiendom rakk til utkanten av
261 universet.", men dommer Douglas hadde ikke tålmodighet for forhistoriske
262 doktriner. I et enkelt avsnitt, ble hundrevis av år med
263 eiendomslovgivningen strøket. Som han skrev på vegne av retten,
264 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
265 [Denne] doktrinen har ingen plass i den moderne verden. Luften er en
266 offentlig motorvei, slik kongressen har erklært. Hvis det ikke var
267 tilfelle, ville hver eneste transkontinentale flyrute utsette operatørene
268 for utallige søksmål om inntrenging på annen manns eiendom. Idéen er i
269 strid med sunn fornuft. Å anerkjenne slike private krav til luftrommet
270 ville blokkere disse motorveiene, seriøst forstyrre muligheten til kontroll
271 og utvikling av dem i fellesskapets interesse og overføre til privat
272 eierskap det som kun fellesskapet har et rimelig krav til.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2893771" href=
"#ftn.id2893771" class=
"footnote">5</a>]
</sup>
273 </p></blockquote></div><p>
274 "Idéen er i strid med sunn fornuft."
277 Det er hvordan loven vanligvis fungerer. Ikke ofte like brått eller
278 utålmodig, men til slutt er dette hvordan loven fungerer. Det var ikke
279 stilen til Douglas å utbrodere. Andre dommere ville ha skrevet mange flere
280 sider før de nådde sin konklusjon, men for Douglas holdt det med en enkel
281 linje: "Idéen er i strid med sunn fornuft.". Men uansett om det tar flere
282 sider eller kun noen få ord, så er det en genial egenskap med et
283 lovpraksis-system, slik som vårt er, at loven tilpasser seg til aktuelle
284 teknologiene. Og mens den tilpasser seg, så endres den. Idéer som var
285 solide som fjell i en tidsalder knuses i en annen.
286 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946388"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946394"></a><p>
287 Eller, det er hvordan ting skjer når det ikke er noen mektige på andre siden
288 av endringen. Causbyene var bare bønder. Og selv om det uten tvil var
289 mange som dem som var lei av den økende trafikken i luften (og en håper ikke
290 for mange kyllinger flakset seg inn i vegger), ville Causbyene i verden
291 finne det svært hardt å samles for å stoppe idéen, og teknologien, som
292 Wright-brødrene hadde ført til verden. Wright-brødrene spyttet flymaskiner
293 inn i den teknologiske meme-dammen. Idéen spredte seg deretter som et virus
294 i en kyllingfarm. Causbyene i verden fant seg selv omringet av "det synes
295 rimelig" gitt teknologien som Wright-brødrene hadde produsert. De kunne stå
296 på sine gårder, med døde kyllinger i hendene, og heve knyttneven mot disse
297 nye teknologiene så mye de ville. De kunne ringe sine representanter eller
298 til og med saksøke. Men når alt kom til alt, ville kraften i det som virket
299 "åpenbart" for alle andre
—makten til "sunn fornuft"
—ville vinne
300 frem. Deres "personlige interesser" ville ikke få lov til å nedkjempe en
301 åpenbar fordel for fellesskapet.
303 Edwin Howard Armstrong er en av USAs glemte oppfinnergenier. Han dukket opp
304 på oppfinnerscenen etter titaner som Thomas Edison og Alexander Graham
305 Bell. Alle hans bidrag på området radioteknologi gjør han til kanskje den
306 viktigste av alle enkeltoppfinnere i de første femti årene av radio. Han
307 var bedre utdannet enn Michael Faraday, som var bokbinderlærling da han
308 oppdaget elektrisk induksjon i
1831. Men han hadde like god intuisjon om
309 hvordan radioverden virket, og ved minst tre anledninger, fant Armstrong opp
310 svært viktig teknologier som brakte vår forståelse av radio et hopp videre.
311 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946457"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946466"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946473"></a>
313 Dagen etter julaften i
1933, ble fire patenter utstedt til Armstrong for
314 hans mest signifikante oppfinnelse
—FM-radio. Inntil da hadde
315 forbrukerradioer vært amplitude-modulert (AM) radio. Tidens teoretikere
316 hadde sagt at frekvens-modulert (FM) radio. De hadde rett når det gjelder
317 et smalt bånd av spektrumet. Men Armstrong oppdaget at frekvens-modulert
318 radio i et vidt bånd i spektrumet leverte en forbløffende gjengivelse av
319 lyd, med mye mindre senderstyrke og støy.
321 Den
5. november
1935 demonstrerte han teknologien på et møte hos institutt
322 for radioingeniører ved Empire State-bygningen i New York City. Han vred
323 radiosøkeren over en rekke AM-stasjoner, inntil radioen låste seg mot en
324 kringkasting som han hadde satt opp
27 kilometer unna. Radioen ble helt
325 stille, som om den var død, og så, med en klarhet ingen andre i rommet noen
326 gang hadde hørt fra et elektrisk apparat, produserte det lyden av en
327 opplesers stemme: "Dette er amatørstasjon W2AG ved Yonkers, New York, som
328 opererer på frekvensmodulering ved to og en halv meter."
330 Publikum hørte noe ingen hadde trodd var mulig:
331 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
332 Et glass vann ble fylt opp foran mikrofonen i Yonkers, og det hørtes ut som
333 et plass som ble fylt opp. . . . Et papir ble krøllet og revet opp, og det
334 hørtes ut som papir og ikke som en sprakende skogbrann. . . . Sousa-marsjer
335 ble spilt av fra plater og en pianosolo og et gitarnummer ble
336 utført. . . . Musikken ble presentert med en livaktighet som sjeldent om
337 noen gang før hadde vært hørt fra en radio-"musikk-boks".
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2946537" href=
"#ftn.id2946537" class=
"footnote">6</a>]
</sup>
338 </p></blockquote></div><p>
340 Som vår egen sunn fornuft forteller oss, hadde Armstrong oppdaget en mye
341 bedre radioteknologi. Men på tidspunktet for hans oppfinnelse, jobbet
342 Armstrong for RCA. RCA var den dominerende aktøren i det da dominerende
343 AM-radiomarkedet. I
1935 var det tusen radiostasjoner over hele USA, men
344 stasjonene i de store byene var alle eid av en liten håndfull selskaper.
347 Presidenten i RCA, David Sarnoff, en venn av Armstrong, var ivrig etter å få
348 Armstrong til å oppdage en måte å fjerne støyen fra AM-radio. Så Sarnoff var
349 ganske spent da Armstrong fortalte ham at han hadde en enhet som fjernet
350 støy fra "radio.". Men da Armstrong demonstrerte sin oppfinnelse, var ikke
351 Sarnoff fornøyd.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2891992"></a>
352 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
353 Jeg trodde Armstrong ville finne opp et slags filter for å fjerne skurring
354 fra AM-radioen vår. Jeg trodde ikke han skulle starte en revolusjon
—
355 starte en hel forbannet ny industri i konkurranse med RCA.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2946485" href=
"#ftn.id2946485" class=
"footnote">7</a>]
</sup>
356 </p></blockquote></div><p>
357 Armstrongs oppfinnelse truet RCAs AM-herredømme, så selskapet lanserte en
358 kampanje for å knuse FM-radio. Mens FM kan ha vært en overlegen teknologi,
359 var Sarnoff en overlegen taktiker. En forfatter beskrev det slik,
360 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2892034"></a>
361 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
362 Kreftene til fordel for FM, i hovedsak ingeniørfaglige, kunne ikke overvinne
363 tyngden til strategien utviklet av avdelingene for salg, patenter og juss
364 for å undertrykke denne trusselen til selskapets posisjon. For FM utgjorde,
365 hvis det fikk utvikle seg uten begrensninger . . . en komplett endring i
366 maktforholdene rundt radio . . . og muligens fjerningen av det nøye
367 begrensede AM-systemet som var grunnlaget for RCA stigning til
368 makt.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2892058" href=
"#ftn.id2892058" class=
"footnote">8</a>]
</sup>
369 </p></blockquote></div><p>
370 RCA holdt først teknologien innomhus, og insistere på at det var nødvendig
371 med ytterligere tester. Da Armstrong, etter to år med testing, ble
372 utålmodig, begynte RCA å bruke sin makt hos myndighetene til holde tilbake
373 den generelle spredningen av FM-radio. I
1936, ansatte RCA den tidligere
374 lederen av FCC og ga ham oppgaven med å sikre at FCC tilordnet
375 radiospekteret på en måte som ville kastrere FM
—hovedsakelig ved å
376 flytte FM-radio til et annet band i spekteret. I første omgang lyktes ikke
377 disse forsøkene. Men mens Armstrong og nasjonen var distrahert av andre
378 verdenskrig, begynte RCAs arbeid å bære frukter. Like etter at krigen var
379 over, annonserte FCC et sett med avgjørelser som ville ha en klar effekt:
380 FM-radio ville bli forkrøplet.Lawrence lessing beskrevet det slik,
381 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
382 Serien med slag mot kroppen som FM-radio mottok rett etter krigen, i en
383 serie med avgjørelser manipulert gjennom FCC av de store radiointeressene,
384 var nesten utrolige i deres kraft og underfundighet.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2892073" href=
"#ftn.id2892073" class=
"footnote">9</a>]
</sup>
385 </p></blockquote></div><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2892088"></a><p>
386 For å gjøre plass i spektrumet for RCAs nyeste satsingsområde, televisjon,
387 skulle FM-radioens brukere flyttes til et helt nytt band i spektrumet.
388 Sendestyrken til FM-radioene ble også redusert, og gjorde at FM ikke lenger
389 kunne brukes for å sende programmer fra en del av landet til en annen.
390 (Denne endringen ble sterkt støttet av AT
&T, på grunn av at fjerningen
391 av FM-videresendingsstasjoner ville bety at radiostasjonene ville bli nødt
392 til å kjøpe kablede linker fra AT
&T.) Spredningen av FM-radio var
393 dermed kvalt, i hvert fall midlertidig.
395 Armstrong sto imot RCAs innsats. Som svar motsto RCA Armstrongs patenter.
396 Etter å ha bakt FM-teknologi inn i den nye standarden for TV, erklærte RCS
397 patentene ugyldige
—uten grunn og nesten femten år etter at de ble
398 utstedet. De nektet dermed å betale ham for bruken av patentene. I seks år
399 kjempet Armstrong en dyr søksmålskrig for å forsvare patentene sine. Til
400 slutt, samtidig som patentene utløp, tilbød RCA et forlik så lavt at det
401 ikke engang dekket Armstrongs advokatregning. Beseiret, knust og nå blakk,
402 skrev Armstrong i
1954 en kort beskjed til sin kone, før han gikk ut av et
403 vindu i trettende etasje og falt i døden.
406 Dette er slik loven virker noen ganger. Ikke ofte like tragisk, og sjelden
407 med heltemodig drama, men noen ganger er det slik det virker. Fra starten
408 har myndigheter og myndighetsorganer blitt tatt til fange. Det er mer
409 sannsynlig at de blir fanget når en mektig interesse er truet av enten en
410 juridisk eller teknologisk endring. Denne mektige interessen utøver for
411 ofte sin innflytelse hos myndighetene til å få myndighetene til å beskytte
412 den. Retorikken for denne beskyttelsen er naturligvis alltid med fokus på
413 fellesskapets beste. Realiteten er noe annet. Idéer som kan være solide
414 som fjell i en tidsalder, men som overlatt til seg selv, vil falle sammen i
415 en annen, er videreført gjennom denne subtile korrupsjonen i vår politiske
416 prosess. RCA hadde hva Causby-ene ikke hadde: Makten til å undertrykke
417 effekten av en teknologisk endring.
419 Det er ingen enkeltoppfinner av Internet. Ei heller er det en god dato som
420 kan brukes til å markere når det ble født. Likevel har internettet i løpet
421 av svært kort tid blitt en del av vanlige amerikaneres liv. I følge the Pew
422 Internet and American Life-prosjektet, har
58 prosent av amerikanerne hatt
423 tilgang til internettet i
2002, opp fra
49 prosent to år
424 tidligere.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2946918" href=
"#ftn.id2946918" class=
"footnote">10</a>]
</sup> Det tallet kan uten
425 problemer passere to tredjedeler av nasjonen ved utgangen av
2004.
427 Etter hvert som internett er blitt integrert inn i det vanlige liv har ting
428 blitt endret. Noen av disse endringene er teknisk
—internettet har
429 gjort kommunikasjon raskere, det har redusert kostnaden med å samle inn
430 data, og så videre. Disse tekniske endringene er ikke fokus for denne
431 boken. De er viktige. De er ikke godt forstått. Men de er den type ting
432 som ganske enkelt ville blir borte hvis vi alle bare slo av internettet. De
433 påvirker ikke folk som ikke bruker internettet, eller i det miste påvirker
434 det ikke dem direkte. De er et godt tema for en bok om internettet. Men
435 dette er ikke en bok om internettet.
437 I stedet er denne boken om effekten av internettet ut over internettet i seg
438 selv. En effekt på hvordan kultur blir skapt. Min påstand er at
439 internettet har ført til en viktig og ukjent endring i denne prosessen.
440 Denne endringen vil forandre en tradisjon som er like gammel som republikken
441 selv. De fleste, hvis de la merke til denne endringen, ville avvise den.
442 Men de fleste legger ikke engang merke til denne endringen som internettet
446 Vi kan få en følelse av denne endringen ved å skille mellom kommersiell og
447 ikke-kommersiell kultur, ved å knytte lovens reguleringer til hver av dem.
448 Med "kommersiell kultur" mener jeg den delen av vår kultur som er produsert
449 og solgt eller produsert for å bli solgt. Med "ikke-kommersiell kultur"
450 mener jeg alt det andre. Da gamle menn satt rundt i parker eller på
451 gatehjørner og fortalte historier som unger og andre lyttet til, så var det
452 ikke-kommersiell kultur. Da Noah Webster publiserte sin "Reader", eller
453 Joel Barlow sin poesi, så var det kommersiell kultur.
455 Fra historisk tid, og for omtrent hele vår tradisjon, har ikke-kommersiell
456 kultur i hovedsak ikke vært regulert. Selvfølgelig, hvis din historie var
457 utuktig, eller hvis dine sanger forstyrret freden, kunne loven gripe inn.
458 Men loven var aldri direkte interessert i skapingen eller spredningen av
459 denne form for kultur, og lot denne kulturen være "fri". Den vanlige måten
460 som vanlige individer delte og formet deres kultur
—historiefortelling,
461 formidling av scener fra teater eller TV, delta i fan-klubber, deling av
462 musikk, laging av kassetter
—ble ikke styrt av lovverket.
464 Fokuset på loven var kommersiell kreativitet. I starten forsiktig, etter
465 hvert betraktelig, beskytter loven insentivet til skaperne ved å tildele dem
466 en eksklusiv rett til deres kreative verker, slik at de kan selge disse
467 eksklusive rettighetene på en kommersiell markedsplass.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2947011" href=
"#ftn.id2947011" class=
"footnote">11</a>]
</sup> Dette er også, naturligvis, en viktig del av
468 kreativitet og kultur, og det har blitt en viktigere og viktigere del i
469 USA. Men det var på ingen måte dominerende i vår tradisjon. Det var i
470 stedet bare en del, en kontrollert del, balansert mot det frie.
472 Denne grove inndelingen mellom den frie og den kontrollerte har nå blitt
473 fjernet.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2947048" href=
"#ftn.id2947048" class=
"footnote">12</a>]
</sup> Internettet har satt scenen
474 for denne fjerningen, og pressen frem av store medieaktører har loven nå
475 påvirket det. For første gang i vår tradisjon, har de vanlige måtene som
476 individer skaper og deler kultur havnet innen rekekvidde for reguleringene
477 til loven, som har blitt utvidet til å dra inn i sitt kontrollområde den
478 enorme mengden kultur og kreativitet som den aldri tidligere har nådd over.
479 Teknologien som tok vare på den historiske balansen
—mellom bruken av
480 den delen av kulturen vår som var fri og bruken av vår kultur som krevde
481 tillatelse
—har blitt borte. Konsekvensen er at vi er mindre og mindre
482 en fri kultur, og mer og mer en tillatelseskultur.
484 Denne endringen blir rettferdiggjort som nødvendig for å beskytte
485 kommersiell kreativitet. Og ganske riktig, proteksjonisme er nøyaktig det
486 som motiverer endringen. Men proteksjonismen som rettferdiggjør endringene
487 som jeg skal beskrive lenger ned er ikke den begrensede og balanserte typen
488 som har definert loven tidligere. Dette er ikke en proteksjonisme for å
489 beskytte artister. Det er i stedet en proteksjonisme for å beskytte
490 bestemte forretningsformer. Selskaper som er truet av potensialet til
491 internettet for å endre måten både kommersiell og ikke-kommersiell kultur
492 blir skapt og delt, har samlet seg for å få lovgiverne til å bruke loven for
493 å beskytte selskapene. Dette er historien om RCA og Armstrong, og det er
494 drømmen til Causbyene.
496 For internettet har sluppet løs en ekstraordinær mulighet for mange til å
497 delta i prosessen med å bygge og kultivere en kultur som rekker lagt utenfor
498 lokale grenselinjer. Den makten har endret markedsplassen for å lage og
499 kultivere kultur generelt, og den endringen truer i neste omgang etablerte
500 innholdsindustrier. Internettet er dermed for industriene som bygget og
501 distribuerte innhold i det tjuende århundret hva FM-radio var for AM-radio,
502 eller hva traileren var for jernbaneindustrien i det nittende århundret:
503 begynnelsen på slutten, eller i hvert fall en markant endring. Digitale
504 teknologier, knyttet til internettet, kunne produsere et mye mer
505 konkurransedyktig og levende marked for å bygge og kultivere kultur. Dette
506 markedet kunne inneholde en mye videre og mer variert utvalg av skapere.
507 Disse skaperne kunne produsere og distribuere et mye mer levende utvalg av
508 kreativitet. Og avhengig av noen få viktige faktorer, så kunne disse
509 skaperne tjenere mer i snitt fra dette systemet enn skaperne gjør i
510 dag
—så lenge RCA-ene av i dag ikke bruker loven til å beskytte dem
511 selv mot denne konkurransen.
513 Likevel, som jeg argumenterer for i sidene som følger, er dette nøyaktig det
514 som skjer i vår kultur i dag. Dette som er dagens ekvivalenter til tidlig
515 tjuende århundres radio og nittende århundres jernbaner bruker deres makt
516 til å få loven til å beskytte dem mot dette nye, mer effektive, mer levende
517 teknologi for å bygge kultur. De lykkes i deres plan om å gjøre om
518 internettet før internettet gjør om på dem.
520 Det ser ikke slik ut for mange. Kamphandlingene over opphavsrett og
521 internettet er fjernt for de fleste. For de få som følger dem, virker de i
522 hovedsak å handle om et enklere sett med spørsmål
—hvorvidt
523 "piratvirksomhet" vil bli akseptert, og hvorvidt "eiendomsretten" vil bli
524 beskyttet. "Krigen" som har blitt erklært mot teknologiene til
525 internettet
—det presidenten for Motion Picture Association of America
526 (MPAA) Jack Valenti kaller sin "egen terroristkrig"
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2947176" href=
"#ftn.id2947176" class=
"footnote">13</a>]
</sup>—har blitt rammet inn som en kamp om å følge
527 loven og respektere eiendomsretten. For å vite hvilken side vi bør ta i
528 denne krigen, de fleste tenker at vi kun trenger å bestemme om hvorvidt vi
529 er for eiendomsrett eller mot den.
531 Hvis dette virkelig var alternativene, så ville jeg være enig med Jack
532 Valenti og innholdsindustrien. Jeg tror også på eiendomsretten, og spesielt
533 på viktigheten av hva Mr. Valenti så pent kaller "kreativ eiendomsrett".
534 Jeg tror at "piratvirksomhet" er galt, og at loven, riktig innstilt, bør
535 straffe "piratvirksomhet", både på og utenfor internettet.
537 Men disse enkle trosoppfatninger maskerer et mye mer grunnleggende spørsmål
538 og en mye mer dramatisk endring. Min frykt er at med mindre vi begynner å
539 legge merke til denne endringen, så vil krigen for å befri verden fra
540 internettets "pirater" også fjerne verdier fra vår kultur som har vært
541 integrert til vår tradisjon helt fra starten.
543 Disse verdiene bygget en tradisjon som, for i hvert fall de første
180 årene
544 av vår republikk, garanterte skaperne rettigheten til å bygge fritt på deres
545 fortid, og beskyttet skaperne og innovatørene fra både statlig og privat
546 kontroll. Det første grunnlovstillegget beskyttet skaperne fra statlig
547 kontroll. Og som professor Neil Netanel kraftfylt argumenterer,
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2946541" href=
"#ftn.id2946541" class=
"footnote">14</a>]
</sup> opphavsrettslov, skikkelig balansert, beskyttet
548 skaperne mot privat kontroll. Vår tradisjon var dermed hverken Sovjet eller
549 tradisjonen til velgjørere. I stedet skar det ut en bred manøvreringsrom
550 hvor skapere kunne kultivere og utvide vår kultur.
552 Likevel har lovens respons til internettet, når det knyttes sammen til
553 endringer i teknologien i internettet selv, ført til massiv økting av den
554 effektive reguleringen av kreativitet i USA. For å bygge på eller kritisere
555 kulturen rundt oss må en spørre, som Oliver Twist, om tillatelse først.
556 Tillatelse er, naturligvis, ofte innvilget
—men det er ikke ofte
557 innvilget til den kritiske eller den uavhengige. Vi har bygget en slags
558 kulturell adel. De innen dette adelskapet har et enkelt liv, mens de på
559 utsiden har det ikke. Men det er adelskap i alle former som er fremmed for
562 Historien som følger er om denne krigen. Er det ikke om "betydningen av
563 teknologi" i vanlig liv. Jeg tror ikke på guder, hverken digitale eller
564 andre typer. Det er heller ikke et forsøk på å demonisere noen individer
565 eller gruppe, jeg tro heller ikke i en djevel, selskapsmessig eller på annen
566 måte. Det er ikke en moralsk historie. Ei heller er det et rop om hellig
567 krig mot en industri.
569 Det er i stedet et forsøk på å forstå en håpløst ødeleggende krig som er
570 inspirert av teknologiene til internettet, men som rekker lang utenfor dens
571 kode. Og ved å forstå denne kampen er den en innsats for å finne veien til
572 fred. Det er ingen god grunn for å fortsette dagens batalje rundt
573 internett-teknologiene. Det vil være til stor skade for vår tradisjon og
574 kultur hvis den får lov til å fortsette ukontrollert. Vi må forstå kilden
575 til denne krigen. Vi må finne en løsning snart.
576 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946624"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946630"></a><p>
577 Lik Causbyenes kamp er denne krigen, delvis, om "eiendomsrett". Eiendommen i
578 denne krigen er ikke like håndfast som den til Causbyene, og ingen uskyldige
579 kyllinger har så langt mistet livet. Likevel er idéene rundt denne
580 "eiendomsretten" like åpenbare for de fleste som Causbyenes krav om
581 ukrenkeligheten til deres bondegård var for dem. De fleste av oss tar for
582 gitt de uvanlig mektige krav som eierne av "immaterielle rettigheter" nå
583 hevder. De fleste av oss, som Causbyene, behandler disse kravene som
584 åpenbare. Og dermed protesterer vi, som Causbyene,, når ny teknologi griper
585 inn i denne eiendomsretten. Det er så klart for oss som det var fro dem at
586 de nye teknologiene til internettet "tar seg til rette" mot legitime krav
587 til "eiendomsrett". Det er like klart for oss som det var for dem at loven
588 skulle ta affære for å stoppe denne inntrengingen i annen manns eiendom.
589 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946674"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946681"></a><p>
591 Og dermed, når nerder og teknologer forsvarer sin tids Armstrong og
592 Wright-brødenes teknologi, får de lite sympati fra de fleste av oss. Sunn
593 fornuft gjør ikke opprør. I motsetning til saken til de uheldige Causbyene,
594 er sunn fornuft på samme side som eiendomseierne i denne krigen. I
595 motsetning til hos de heldige Wright-brødrene, har internettet ikke
596 inspirert en revolusjon til fordel for seg.
598 Mitt håp er å skyve denne sunne fornuften videre. Jeg har blitt stadig mer
599 overrasket over kraften til denne idéen om immaterielle rettigheter og, mer
600 viktig, dets evne til å slå av kritisk tanke hos lovmakere og innbyggere.
601 Det har aldri før i vår historie vært så mye av vår "kultur" som har vært
602 "eid" enn det er nå. Og likevel har aldri før konsentrasjonen av makt til å
603 kontrollere
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>bruken
</em></span> av kulturen vært mer akseptert uten
604 spørsmål enn det er nå.
606 Gåten er, hvorfor det? Er det fordi vi fått en innsikt i sannheten om
607 verdien og betydningen av absolutt eierskap over idéer og kultur? Er det
608 fordi vi har oppdaget at vår tradisjon med å avvise slike absolutte krav var
611 Eller er det på grunn av at idéer om absolutt eierskap over idéer og kultur
612 gir fordeler til RCA-ene i vår tid, og passer med vår ureflekterte
615 Er denne radikale endringen vekk fra vår tradisjon om fri kultur en
616 forekomst av USA som korrigerer en feil fra sin fortid, slik vi gjorde det
617 etter en blodig krig mot slaveri, og slik vi sakte gjør det mot
618 forskjellsbehandling? Eller er denne radikale endringen vekk fra vår
619 tradisjon med fri kultur nok et eksempel på at vårt politiske system er
620 fanget av noen få mektige særinteresser?
622 Fører sunn fornuft til det ekstreme i dette spørsmålet på grunn av at sunn
623 fornuft faktisk tror på dette ekstreme? Eller står sunn fornuft i stillhet
624 i møtet med dette ekstreme fordi, som med Armstrong versus RCA, at den mer
625 mektige siden har sikret seg at det har et mye mer mektig synspunkt?
626 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946772"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946778"></a><p>
628 Jeg forsøker ikke å være mystisk. Mine egne synspunkter er klare. Jeg mener
629 det var riktig for sunn fornuft å gjøre opprør mot ekstremismen til
630 Causbyene. Jeg mener det ville være riktig for sunn fornuft å gjøre opprør
631 mot de ekstreme krav som gjøres i dag på vegne av "immaterielle
632 rettigheter". Det som loven krever i dag er mer å mer like dumt som om
633 lensmannen skulle arrestere en flymaskin for å trenge inn på annen manns
634 eiendom. Men konsekvensene av den nye dumskapen vil bli mye mer
638 Basketaket som pågår akkurat nå senterer seg rundt to idéer:
639 "piratvirksomhet" og "eiendom". Mitt mål med denne bokens neste to deler er
640 å utforske disse to idéene.
642 Metoden min er ikke den vanlige metoden for en akademiker. Jeg ønsker ikke
643 å pløye deg inn i et komplisert argument, steinsatt med referanser til
644 obskure franske teoretikere
—uansett hvor naturlig det har blitt for
645 den rare sorten vi akademikere har blitt. Jeg vil i stedet begynne hver del
646 med en samling historier som etablerer en sammenheng der disse
647 tilsynelatende enkle idéene kan bli fullt ut forstått.
649 De to delene setter opp kjernen i påstanden til denne boken: at mens
650 internettet faktisk har produsert noe fantastisk og nytt, bidrar våre
651 myndigheter, presset av store medieaktører for å møte dette "noe nytt" til å
652 ødelegge noe som er svært gammelt. I stedet for å forstå endringene som
653 internettet kan gjøre mulig, og i stedet for å ta den tiden som trengs for å
654 la "sunn fornuft" finne ut hvordan best svare på utfordringen, så lar vi de
655 som er mest truet av endringene bruke sin makt til å endre loven
—og
656 viktigere, å bruke sin makt til å endre noe fundamentalt om hvordan vi
659 Jeg tror vi tillater dette, ikke fordi det er riktig, og heller ikke fordi
660 de fleste av oss tror på disse endringene. Vi tillater det på grunn av at
661 de interessene som er mest truet er blant de mest mektige aktørene i vår
662 deprimerende kompromitterte prosess for å utforme lover. Denne boken er
663 historien om nok en konsekvens for denne type korrupsjon
—en konsekvens
664 for de fleste av oss forblir ukjent med.
665 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2893660" href=
"#id2893660" class=
"para">4</a>]
</sup>
666 St. George Tucker,
<em class=
"citetitle">Blackstone's Commentaries
</em> 3 (South
667 Hackensack, N.J.: Rothman Reprints,
1969),
18.
668 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2893771" href=
"#id2893771" class=
"para">5</a>]
</sup>
669 USA mot Causby, U.S.
328 (
1946):
256,
261. Domstolen fant at det kunne være
670 å "ta" hvis regjeringens bruk av sitt land reelt sett hadde ødelagt verdien
671 av eiendomen til Causby. Dette eksemplet ble foreslått for meg i Keith
672 Aokis flotte stykke, "(intellectual) Property and Sovereignty: Notes Toward
673 a cultural Geography of Authorship",
<em class=
"citetitle">Stanford Law
674 Review
</em> 48 (
1996):
1293,
1333. Se også Paul Goldstein,
675 <em class=
"citetitle">Real Property
</em> (Mineola, N.Y.: Foundation Press
676 (
1984)),
1112–13.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946359"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946353"></a>
677 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2946537" href=
"#id2946537" class=
"para">6</a>]
</sup>
678 Lawrence Lessing,
<em class=
"citetitle">Man of High Fidelity:: Edwin Howard
679 Armstrong
</em> (Philadelphia: J. B. Lipincott Company,
1956),
209.
680 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2946485" href=
"#id2946485" class=
"para">7</a>]
</sup> Se "Saints: The Heroes and Geniuses of the Electronic Era," første
681 elektroniske kirke i USA, hos www.webstationone.com/fecha, tilgjengelig fra
682 <a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
1</a>.
683 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2892058" href=
"#id2892058" class=
"para">8</a>]
</sup>Lessing,
226.
684 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2892073" href=
"#id2892073" class=
"para">9</a>]
</sup>
686 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2946918" href=
"#id2946918" class=
"para">10</a>]
</sup>
687 Amanda Lenhart, "The Ever-Shifting Internet Population: A New Look at
688 Internet Access and the Digital Divide," Pew Internet and American Life
689 Project,
15. april
2003:
6, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
2</a>.
690 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2947011" href=
"#id2947011" class=
"para">11</a>]
</sup>
691 Dette er ikke det eneste formålet med opphavsrett, men det er helt klart
692 hovedformålet med opphavsretten slik den er etablert i føderal grunnlov.
693 Opphavsrettslovene i delstatene beskyttet historisk ikke bare kommersielle
694 interesse når det gjalt publikasjoner, men også personverninteresser. Ved å
695 gi forfattere eneretten til å publisere først, ga delstatenes
696 opphavsrettslovene forfatterne makt til å kontrollere spredningen av fakta
697 om seg selv. Se Samuel D. Warren og Louis Brandeis, "The Right to Privacy",
698 Harvard Law Review
4 (
1890):
193,
198–200.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946540"></a>
699 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2947048" href=
"#id2947048" class=
"para">12</a>]
</sup>
700 Se Jessica Litman,
<em class=
"citetitle">Digital Copyright
</em> (New York:
701 Prometheus bøker,
2001), kap.
13.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2947056"></a>
702 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2947176" href=
"#id2947176" class=
"para">13</a>]
</sup>
703 Amy Harmon, "Black Hawk Download: Moving Beyond Music, Pirates Use New Tools
704 to Turn the Net into an Illicit Video Club,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New York
705 Times
</em>,
17. januar
2002.
706 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2946541" href=
"#id2946541" class=
"para">14</a>]
</sup>
707 Neil W. Netanel, "Copyright and a Democratic Civil Society,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Yale
708 Law Journal
</em> 106 (
1996):
283.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2946550"></a>
709 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"part" title='Del I.
"Piratvirksomhet"'
><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h1 class=
"title"><a name=
"c-piracy"></a>Del I. "Piratvirksomhet"
</h1></div></div></div><div class=
"partintro" title='
"Piratvirksomhet"'
><div></div><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxmansfield1"></a><p>
710 Helt siden loven begynte å regulere kreative eierrettigheter, har det vært
711 en krig mot "piratvirksomhet". De presise konturene av dette konseptet,
712 "piratvirksomhet", har vært vanskelig å tegne opp, men bildet av
713 urettferdighet er enkelt å beskrive. Som Lord Mansfield skrev i en sak som
714 utvidet rekkevidden for engelsk opphavsrettslov til å inkludere noteark,
715 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
716 En person kan bruke kopien til å spille den, men han har ingen rett til å
717 robbe forfatteren for profitten, ved å lage flere kopier og distribuere
718 etter eget forgodtbefinnende.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2947890" href=
"#ftn.id2947890" class=
"footnote">15</a>]
</sup>
719 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2947904"></a></blockquote></div><p>
721 I dag er vi midt inne i en annen "krig" mot "piratvirksomhet". Internettet
722 har fremprovosert denne krigen. Internettet gjør det mulig å effektivt spre
723 innhold. Peer-to-peer (p2p) fildeling er blant det mest effektive av de
724 effektive teknologier internettet muliggjør. Ved å bruke distribuert
725 intelligens, kan p2p-systemer muliggjøre enkel spredning av innhold på en
726 måte som ingen forestilte seg for en generasjon siden.
729 Denne effektiviteten respekterer ikke de tradisjonelle skillene i
730 opphavsretten. Nettverket skiller ikke mellom deling av
731 opphavsrettsbeskyttet og ikke opphavsrettsbeskyttet innhold. Dermed har det
732 vært deling av en enorm mengde opphavsrettsbeskyttet innhold. Denne
733 delingen har i sin tur ansporet til krigen, på grunn av at eiere av
734 opphavsretter frykter delingen vil "frata forfatteren overskuddet."
736 Krigerne har snudd seg til domstolene, til lovgiverne, og i stadig større
737 grad til teknologi for å forsvare sin "eiendom" mot denne
738 "piratvirksomheten". En generasjon amerikanere, advarer krigerne, blir
739 oppdratt til å tro at "eiendom" skal være "gratis". Glem tatoveringer, ikke
740 tenk på kroppspiercing
—våre barn blir
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>tyver
</em></span>!
742 Det er ingen tvil om at "piratvirksomhet" er galt, og at pirater bør
743 straffes. Men før vi roper på bødlene, bør vi sette dette
744 "piratvirksomhets"-begrepet i en sammenheng. For mens begrepet blir mer og
745 mer brukt, har det i sin kjerne en ekstraordinær idé som nesten helt sikkert
748 Idéen høres omtrent slik ut:
749 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
750 Kreativt arbeid har verdi. Når jeg bruker, eller tar, eller bygger på det
751 kreative arbeidet til andre, så tar jeg noe fra dem som har verdi. Når jeg
752 tar noe av verdi fra noen andre, bør jeg få tillatelse fra dem. Å ta noe
753 som har verdi fra andre uten tillatelse er galt. Det er en form for
755 </p></blockquote></div><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2948003"></a><p>
756 Dette synet går dypt i de pågående debattene. Det er hva jussprofessor
757 Rochelle Dreyfuss ved NYU kritiserer som "hvis verdi, så rettighet"-teorien
758 for kreative eierrettigheter
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2948018" href=
"#ftn.id2948018" class=
"footnote">16</a>]
</sup>—hvis det finnes verdi, så må noen ha rettigheten til denne
759 verdien. Det er perspektivet som fikk komponistenes rettighetsorganisasjon,
760 ASCAP, til å saksøke jentespeiderne for å ikke betale for sangene som
761 jentene sagt rundt jentespeidernes leirbål.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2948038" href=
"#ftn.id2948038" class=
"footnote">17</a>]
</sup> Det fantes "verdi" (sangene), så det måtte ha vært en
762 "rettighet"
—til og med mot jentespeiderne.
763 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2948067"></a><p>
765 Denne idéen er helt klart en mulig forståelse om hvordan kreative
766 eierrettigheter bør virke. Det er helt klart et mulig design for et
767 lovsystem som beskytter kreative eierrettigheter. Men teorien om "hvis
768 verdi, så rettighet" for kreative eierrettigheter har aldri vært USAs teori
769 for kreative eierrettigheter. It har aldri stått rot i vårt lovverk.
771 I vår tradisjon har immaterielle rettigheter i stedet vært et instrument.
772 Det bygger fundamentet for et rikt kreativt samfunn, men er fortsatt servilt
773 til verdien av kreativitet. Dagens debatt har snudd dette helt rundt. Vi
774 har blitt så opptatt av å beskytte instrumentet at vi mister verdien av
777 Kilden til denne forvirringen er et skille som loven ikke lenger bryr seg om
778 å markere
—skillet mellom å gjenpublisere noens verk på den ene siden,
779 og bygge på og gjøre om verket på den andre. Da opphavsretten kom var det
780 kun publisering som ble berørt. Opphavsretten i dag regulerer begge.
782 Før teknologiene til internettet dukket opp, betød ikke denne begrepsmessige
783 sammenblandingen mye. Teknologiene for å publisere var kostbare, som betød
784 at det meste av publisering var kommersiell. Kommersielle aktører kunne
785 håndtere byrden pålagt av loven
—til og med byrden som den bysantiske
786 kompleksiteten som opphavsrettsloven har blitt. Det var bare nok en kostnad
787 ved å drive forretning.
788 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2948120"></a><p>
789 But with the birth of the Internet, this natural limit to the reach of the
790 law has disappeared. The law controls not just the creativity of commercial
791 creators but effectively that of anyone. Although that expansion would not
792 matter much if copyright law regulated only "copying," when the law
793 regulates as broadly and obscurely as it does, the extension matters a
794 lot. The burden of this law now vastly outweighs any original
795 benefit
—certainly as it affects noncommercial creativity, and
796 increasingly as it affects commercial creativity as well. Thus, as we'll see
797 more clearly in the chapters below, the law's role is less and less to
798 support creativity, and more and more to protect certain industries against
799 competition. Just at the time digital technology could unleash an
800 extraordinary range of commercial and noncommercial creativity, the law
801 burdens this creativity with insanely complex and vague rules and with the
802 threat of obscenely severe penalties. We may be seeing, as Richard Florida
803 writes, the "Rise of the Creative Class."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2948129" href=
"#ftn.id2948129" class=
"footnote">18</a>]
</sup> Unfortunately, we are also seeing an extraordinary rise of
804 regulation of this creative class.
806 Disse byrdene gir ingen mening i vår tradisjon. Vi bør begynne med å forstå
807 den tradisjonen litt mer, og ved å plassere dagens slag om oppførsel med
808 merkelappen "piratvirksomhet" i sin rette sammenheng.
809 </p><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#creators">2. Kapittel en: Skaperne
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#mere-copyists">3. Kapittel to:
"Kun etter-apere"</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#catalogs">4. Kapittel tre: Kataloger
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#pirates">5. Kapittel fire:
"Pirater"</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#film">Film
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#recordedmusic">Innspilt musikk
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#radio">Radio
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#cabletv">Kabel-TV
</a></span></dt></dl></dd><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#piracy">6. Kapittel fem:
"Piratvirksomhet"</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#piracy-i">Piracy I
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#piracy-ii">Piracy II
</a></span></dt></dl></dd></dl></div><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2947890" href=
"#id2947890" class=
"para">15</a>]
</sup>
812 <em class=
"citetitle">Bach
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Longman
</em>,
98
813 Eng. Rep.
1274 (
1777) (Mansfield).
814 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2948018" href=
"#id2948018" class=
"para">16</a>]
</sup>
817 Se Rochelle Dreyfuss, "Expressive Genericity: Trademarks as Language in the
818 Pepsi Generation,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Notre Dame Law Review
</em> 65 (
1990):
820 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2948038" href=
"#id2948038" class=
"para">17</a>]
</sup>
822 Lisa Bannon, "The Birds May Sing, but Campers Can't Unless They Pay Up,"
823 <em class=
"citetitle">Wall Street Journal
</em>,
21. august
1996, tilgjengelig
824 fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
3</a>; Jonathan
825 Zittrain, "Calling Off the Copyright War: In Battle of Property vs. Free
826 Speech, No One Wins,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Boston Globe
</em>,
24. november
827 2002.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2948056"></a>
828 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2948129" href=
"#id2948129" class=
"para">18</a>]
</sup>
830 I
<em class=
"citetitle">The Rise of the Creative Class
</em> (New York: Basic
831 Books,
2002), dokumenterer Richard Florida en endring i arbeidsstokken mot
832 kreativitetsarbeide. Hans tekst omhandler derimot ikke direkte de juridiske
833 vilkår som kreativiteten blir muliggjort eller hindret under. Jeg er helt
834 klart enig med ham i viktigheten og betydningen av denne endringen, men jeg
835 tror også at vilkårene som disse endringene blir aktivert under er mye
836 vanskeligere.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2948184"></a>
837 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 2. Kapittel en: Skaperne"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"creators"></a>Kapittel
2. Kapittel en: Skaperne
</h2></div></div></div><p>
838 I
1928 ble en tegnefilmfigur født. En tidlig Mikke Mus debuterte i mai
839 dette året, i en stille flopp ved navn
<em class=
"citetitle">Plane Crazy
</em>.
840 I november, i Colony teateret i New York City, ble den første vidt
841 distribuerte tegnefilmen med synkronisert lyd,
<em class=
"citetitle">Steamboat
842 Willy
</em>, vist frem med figuren som skulle bli til Mikke Mus.
844 Film med sykronisert lyd hadde blitt introdusert et år tidligere i filmen
845 <em class=
"citetitle">The Jazz Singer
</em>. Suksessen fikk Walt Disney til å
846 kopiere teknikken og mikse lyd med tegnefilm. Ingen visste hvorvidt det
847 ville virke eller ikke, og om det fungere, hvorvidt publikum villa ha sans
848 for det. Men da Disney gjorde en test sommeren
1928, var resutlatet
849 entydig. Som Disney beskriver dette første eksperimentet,
850 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
852 Et par av guttene mine kunne lese noteark, og en av dem kunne spille
853 munnspill. Vi stappet dem inn i et rom hvor de ikke kunne se skjermen, og
854 gjorde det slik at lyden de spilte ble sendt videre til et rom hvor våre
855 koner og venner var plassert for å se på bildet.
858 Guttene brukte et note- og lydeffekt-ark. Etter noen dårlige oppstarter,
859 kom endelig lyd og handlig i gang med et smell. Munnspilleren spilte
860 melodien, og resten av oss i lydavdelingen slamret på tinnkasseroller og
861 blåste på slide-fløyte til rytmen. Synkroniseringen var nesten helt riktig.
863 Effekten på vårt lille publikum var intet mindre enn elektrisk. De reagerte
864 nesten instiktivt til denne union av lyd og bevegelse. Jeg trodde de tullet
865 med meg. Så de puttet meg i publikum og satte igang på nytt. Det var
866 grufult, men det var fantastisk. Og det var noe nytt!
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2948298" href=
"#ftn.id2948298" class=
"footnote">19</a>]
</sup>
867 </p></blockquote></div><p>
868 Disneys daværende partner, og en av animasjonsverdenens mest ekstraordinære
869 talenter, Ub Iwerks, uttalte det sterkere: "Jeg har aldri vært så begeistret
870 i hele mitt liv. Ingenting annet har noen sinne vært like bra."
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2948320"></a>
872 Disney hadde laget noe helt nyt, basert på noe relativt nytt. Synkronisert
873 lyd ga liv til en form for kreativitet som sjeldent hadde
—unntatt fra
874 Disneys hender
—vært noe annet en fyllstoff for andre filmer. Gjennom
875 animasjonens tidligere historie var det Disneys oppfinnelse som satte
876 standarden som andre måtte sloss for å oppfylle. Og ganske ofte var Disneys
877 store geni, hans gnist av kreativitet, bygget på arbeidet til andre.
879 Dette er kjent stoff. Det du kanskje ikke vet er at
1928 også markerer en
880 annen viktig overgang. I samme år laget et komedie-geni (i motsetning til
881 tegnefilm-geni) sin siste uavhengig produserte stumfilm. Dette geniet var
882 Buster Keaton. Filmen var
<em class=
"citetitle">Steamboat Bill, Jr
</em>.
884 Keaton ble født inn i en vauderville-familie i
1895. I stumfilm-æraen hadde
885 han mestret bruken av bredpenslet fysisk komedie på en måte som tente
886 ukontrollerbar latter fra hans publikum.
<em class=
"citetitle">Steamboat Bill,
887 Jr
</em>. var en klassiker av denne typen, berømt blant film-elskere
888 for sine utrolige stunts. Filmen var en klassisk Keaton
—fantastisk
889 populær og blant de beste i sin sjanger.
891 <em class=
"citetitle">Steamboat Bill, Jr
</em>. kom før Disneys tegnefilm
892 Steamboat Willie. Det er ingen tilfeldighet at titlene er så
893 like. Steamboat Willie er en direkte tegneserieparodi av Steamboat
894 Bill,
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2948391" href=
"#ftn.id2948391" class=
"footnote">20</a>]
</sup> og begge bygger på en felles sang
895 som kilde. Det er ikke kun fra nyskapningen med synkronisert lyd i
896 <em class=
"citetitle">The Jazz Singer
</em> at vi får
<em class=
"citetitle">Steamboat
897 Willie
</em>. Det er også fra Buster Keatons nyskapning Steamboat
898 Bill, Jr., som igjen var inspirert av sangen "Steamboat Bill", at vi får
899 Steamboat Willie. Og fra Steamboat Willie får vi så Mikke Mus.
901 Denne "låningen" var ikke unik, hverken for Disney eller for industrien.
902 Disney apet alltid etter full-lengde massemarkedsfilmene rundt
903 ham.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2948444" href=
"#ftn.id2948444" class=
"footnote">21</a>]
</sup> Det samme gjorde mange andre.
904 Tidlige tegnefilmer er stappfulle av etterapninger
—små variasjoner
905 over suksessfulle temaer, gamle historier fortalt på nytt. Nøkkelen til
906 suksess var brilliansen i forskjellene. Med Disney var det lyden som ga
907 gnisten til hans animasjoner. Senere var det kvaliteten på hans arbeide
908 relativt til de masseproduserte tegnefilmene som han konkurrerte med.
909 Likevel var disse bidragene bygget på toppen av fundamentet som var lånt.
910 Disney bygget på arbeidet til andre som kom før han, og skapte noe nytt ut
911 av noe som bare var litt gammelt.
913 Noen ganger var låningen begrenset, og noen ganger var den betydelig. Tenkt
914 på eventurene til brødrene Grimm. Hvis du er like ubevisst som jeg var, så
915 tror du sannsynlighvis at disse fortellingene er glade, søte historier som
916 passer for ethvert barn ved leggetid. Realiteten er at Grimm-eventyrene er,
917 for oss, ganske dystre. Det er noen sjeldne og kanskje spesielt ambisiøse
918 foreldre som ville våge å lese disse blodige moralistiske historiene til
919 sine barn, ved leggetid eller hvilken som helst annet tidspunkt.
922 Disney tok disse historiene og fortalte dem på nytt på en måte som førte dem
923 inn i en ny tidsalder. Han ga historiene liv, med både karakterer og
924 lys. Uten å fjerne bitene av frykt og fare helt, gjorde han morsomt det som
925 var mørkt og satte inn en ekte følelse av medfølelse der det før var
926 frykt. Og ikke bare med verkene av brødrene Grimm. Faktisk er katalogen
927 over Disney-arbeid som baserer seg på arbeidet til andre ganske forbløffende
928 når den blir samlet:
<em class=
"citetitle">Snøhvit
</em> (
1937),
929 <em class=
"citetitle">Fantasia
</em> (
1940),
<em class=
"citetitle">Pinocchio
</em>
930 (
1940),
<em class=
"citetitle">Dumbo
</em> (
1941),
<em class=
"citetitle">Bambi
</em>
931 (
1942),
<em class=
"citetitle">Song of the South
</em> (
1946),
932 <em class=
"citetitle">Askepott
</em> (
1950),
<em class=
"citetitle">Alice in
933 Wonderland
</em> (
1951),
<em class=
"citetitle">Robin Hood
</em> (
1952),
934 <em class=
"citetitle">Peter Pan
</em> (
1953),
<em class=
"citetitle">Lady og
935 landstrykeren
</em> (
1955),
<em class=
"citetitle">Mulan
</em> (
1998),
936 <em class=
"citetitle">Tornerose
</em> (
1959),
<em class=
"citetitle">101
937 dalmatinere
</em> (
1961),
<em class=
"citetitle">Sverdet i steinen
</em>
938 (
1963), og
<em class=
"citetitle">Jungelboken
</em> (
1967)
—for ikke å nevne
939 et nylig eksempel som vi bør kanskje glemme raskt,
<em class=
"citetitle">Treasure
940 Planet
</em> (
2003). I alle disse tilfellene, har Disney (eller
941 Disney, Inc.) hentet kreativitet fra kultur rundt ham, blandet med
942 kreativiteten fra sitt eget ekstraordinære talent, og deretter brent denne
943 blandingen inn i sjelen til sin kultur. Hente, blande og brenne.
945 Dette er en type kreativitet. Det er en kreativitet som vi bør huske på og
946 feire. Det er noen som vil si at det finnes ingen kreativitet bortsett fra
947 denne typen. Vi trenger ikke gå så langt for å anerkjenne dens betydning.
948 Vi kan kalle dette "Disney-kreativitet", selv om det vil være litt
949 misvisende. Det er mer presist "Walt Disney-kreativitet"
—en
950 uttrykksform og genialitet som bygger på kulturen rundt oss og omformer den
952 </p><p> In
1928, the culture that Disney was free to draw upon was relatively
953 fresh. The public domain in
1928 was not very old and was therefore quite
954 vibrant. The average term of copyright was just around thirty
955 years
—for that minority of creative work that was in fact
956 copyrighted.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2948586" href=
"#ftn.id2948586" class=
"footnote">22</a>]
</sup> That means that for thirty
957 years, on average, the authors or copyright holders of a creative work had
958 an "exclusive right" to control certain uses of the work. To use this
959 copyrighted work in limited ways required the permission of the copyright
962 Når opphavsrettens vernetid er over, faller et verk i det fri og blir
963 allemannseie. Ingen tillatelse trengs da for å bygge på eller bruke dette
964 verket. Ingen tillatelse og dermed, ingen advokater. Allemannseie er en
965 "advokat-fri sone". Det meste av innhold fra det nittende århundre var
966 dermed fritt tilgjengelig for Disney å bruke eller bygge på i
1928. Det var
967 tilgjengelig for enhver
—uansett om de hadde forbindelser eller ikke,
968 om de var rik eller ikke, om de var akseptert eller ikke
—til å bruke
972 Dette er slik det alltid har vært
—inntil ganske nylig. For
973 mesteparten av vår historie, har allemannseiet vært like over horisonten.
974 Fram til
1978 var den gjennomsnittelige opphavsrettslige vernetiden aldri
975 mer enn trettito år, som gjorde at det meste av kultur fra en og en halv
976 generasjon tidligere var tilgjengelig for enhver å bygge på uten tillatelse
977 fra noen. Tilsvarende for i dag ville være at kreative verker fra
1960- ot
978 1970-tallet nå ville være fritt tilgjengelig for de neste Walt Disney å
979 bygge på uten tillatelse. Men i dag er allemannseie presumtivt kun for
980 innhold fra før mellomkrigstiden.
982 Walt Disney hadde selvfølgelig ikke monopol på "Walt Disney-kreativitet".
983 Det har heller ikke USA. Normen med fri kultur har, inntil nylig, og
984 unntatt i totalitære nasjoner, vært bredt utnyttet og svært universell.
986 Vurder for eksempel en form for kreativitet som synes underlig for mange
987 amerikanere, men som er overalt i japansk kultur:
988 <em class=
"citetitle">manga
</em>, eller tegneserier. Japanerne er fanatiske når
989 det gjelder tegneserier. Over
40 prosent av publikasjoner er tegneserier,
990 og
30 prosent av publikasjonsomsetningen stammer fra tegneserier. De er
991 over alt i det japanske samfunnet, tilgjengelig fra ethver
992 tidsskriftsutsalg, og i hendene på en stor andel av pendlere på Japans
993 ekstraordinære system for offentlig transport.
995 Amerikanere har en tendens til å se ned på denne formen for kultur. Det er
996 et lite attraktivt kjennetegn hos oss. Vi misforstår sansynligvis mye rundt
997 manga, pgå grunn av at få av oss noen gang har lest noe som ligner på
998 historiene i disse "grafiske historiene" forteller. For en japaner dekker
999 manga ethvert aspekt ved det sosiale liv. For oss er tegneserier "menn i
1000 strømpebukser". Og uansett er det ikke slik at T-banen i New York er full
1001 av folk som leser Joyse eller Hemingway for den saks skyld. Folk i ulike
1002 kulturer skiller seg ut på forskjellig måter, og japanerne på dette
1005 Men mitt formål her er ikke å forstå manga. Det er å beskrive en variant av
1006 manga som fra en advokats perspektiv er ganske merkelig, men som fra en
1007 Disneys perspektiv er ganske godt kjent.
1010 Dette er fenomenet
<em class=
"citetitle">doujinshi
</em>. Doujinshi er også
1011 tegneserier, men de er slags etterapings-tegneserier. En rik etikk styrer
1012 de som skaper doujinshi. Det er ikke doujinshi hvis det
1013 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>bare
</em></span> er en kopi. Kunstneren må gjøre et bidrag til
1014 kunsten han kopierer ved å omforme det entet subtilt eller betydelig. En
1015 doujinshi-tegneserie kan dermed ta en massemarkeds-tegneserie og utvikle den
1016 i en annen retning
—med en annen historie-linje. Eller tegneserien kan
1017 beholde figuren som seg selv men endre litt på utseendet. Det er ingen
1018 bestemt formel for hva som gjør en doujinshi tilstrekkelig "forskjellig".
1019 Men de må være forskjellige hvis de skal anses som ekte doujinshi. Det er
1020 faktisk komiteer som går igjennom doujinshi for å bli med på messer, og
1021 avviser etterapninger som bare er en kopi.
1023 Disse etterapings-tegneseriene er ikke en liten del av manga-markedet. Det
1024 er enorme. Mer en
33 000 "sirkler" av skapere over hele Japan som
1025 produserer disse bitene av Walt Disney-kreativitet. Mer en
450 000
1026 japanesere samles to ganger i året, i den største offentlige samlingen i
1027 langet, for å bytte og selge dem. Dette markedet er parallellt med det
1028 kommersielle massemarkeds-manga-markedet. På noen måter konkurrerer det
1029 åpenbart med det markedet, men det er ingen vedvarende innsats fra de som
1030 kontrollerer det kommersielle manga-markedet for å stenge
1031 doujinshi-markedet. Det blostrer, på tross av konkurransen og til tross for
1034 Den mest gåtefulle egenskapen med doujinshi-markedet, for de som har
1035 juridisk trening i hvert fall, er at det overhodet tillates å eksistere.
1036 Under japansk opphavsrettslov, som i hvert fall på dette området (på
1037 papiret) speiler USAs opphavsrettslov, er doujinshi-markedet ulovlig.
1038 Doujinshi er helt klart "avledede verk". Det er ingen generell praksis hos
1039 doujinshi-kunstnere for å sikre seg tillatelse hos manga-skaperne. I stedet
1040 er praksisen ganske enkelt å ta og endre det andre har laget, slik Walt
1041 Disney gjorde med
<em class=
"citetitle">Steamboat Bill, Jr
</em>. For både
1042 japansk og USAs lov, er å "ta" uten tillatelse fra den opprinnelige
1043 opphavsrettsinnehaver ulovlig. Det er et brudd på opphavsretten til det
1044 opprinnelige verket å lage en kopi eller et avledet verk uten tillatelse fra
1045 den opprinnelige rettighetsinnehaveren.
1046 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxwinickjudd"></a><p>
1047 Likevel eksisterer dette illegale markedet og faktisk blomstrer i Japan, og
1048 etter manges syn er det nettopp fordi det eksisterer at japansk manga
1049 blomstrer. Som USAs tegneserieskaper Judd Winick fortalte meg, "I
1050 amerikansk tegneseriers første dager var det ganske likt det som foregår i
1051 Japan i dag. . . . Amerikanske tegneserier kom til verden ved å kopiere
1052 hverandre. . . . Det er slik [kunstnerne] lærer å tegne
—ved å se i
1053 tegneseriebøker og ikke følge streken, men ved å se på dem og kopiere dem"
1054 og bygge basert på dem.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2948742" href=
"#ftn.id2948742" class=
"footnote">23</a>]
</sup>
1056 Amerikanske tegneserier nå er ganske annerledes, forklarer Winick, delvis på
1057 grunn av de juridiske problemene med å tilpasse tegneserier slik doujinshi
1058 får lov til. Med for eksempel Supermann, fortalte Winick meg, "er det en
1059 rekke regler, og du må følge dem". Det er ting som Supermann "ikke kan"
1060 gjøre. "For en som lager tegneserier er det frustrerende å måtte begrense
1061 seg til noen parameter som er femti år gamle."
1062 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2948867"></a><p>
1063 The norm in Japan mitigates this legal difficulty. Some say it is precisely
1064 the benefit accruing to the Japanese manga market that explains the
1065 mitigation. Temple University law professor Salil Mehra, for example,
1066 hypothesizes that the manga market accepts these technical violations
1067 because they spur the manga market to be more wealthy and
1068 productive. Everyone would be worse off if doujinshi were banned, so the law
1069 does not ban doujinshi.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2948893" href=
"#ftn.id2948893" class=
"footnote">24</a>]
</sup>
1071 The problem with this story, however, as Mehra plainly acknowledges, is that
1072 the mechanism producing this laissez faire response is not clear. It may
1073 well be that the market as a whole is better off if doujinshi are permitted
1074 rather than banned, but that doesn't explain why individual copyright owners
1075 don't sue nonetheless. If the law has no general exception for doujinshi,
1076 and indeed in some cases individual manga artists have sued doujinshi
1077 artists, why is there not a more general pattern of blocking this "free
1078 taking" by the doujinshi culture?
1080 I spent four wonderful months in Japan, and I asked this question as often
1081 as I could. Perhaps the best account in the end was offered by a friend from
1082 a major Japanese law firm. "We don't have enough lawyers," he told me one
1083 afternoon. There "just aren't enough resources to prosecute cases like
1087 This is a theme to which we will return: that regulation by law is a
1088 function of both the words on the books and the costs of making those words
1089 have effect. For now, focus on the obvious question that is begged: Would
1090 Japan be better off with more lawyers? Would manga be richer if doujinshi
1091 artists were regularly prosecuted? Would the Japanese gain something
1092 important if they could end this practice of uncompensated sharing? Does
1093 piracy here hurt the victims of the piracy, or does it help them? Would
1094 lawyers fighting this piracy help their clients or hurt them? Let's pause
1097 If you're like I was a decade ago, or like most people are when they first
1098 start thinking about these issues, then just about now you should be puzzled
1099 about something you hadn't thought through before.
1101 We live in a world that celebrates "property." I am one of those
1102 celebrants. I believe in the value of property in general, and I also
1103 believe in the value of that weird form of property that lawyers call
1104 "intellectual property."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2948961" href=
"#ftn.id2948961" class=
"footnote">25</a>]
</sup> A large,
1105 diverse society cannot survive without property; a large, diverse, and
1106 modern society cannot flourish without intellectual property.
1108 But it takes just a second's reflection to realize that there is plenty of
1109 value out there that "property" doesn't capture. I don't mean "money can't
1110 buy you love," but rather, value that is plainly part of a process of
1111 production, including commercial as well as noncommercial production. If
1112 Disney animators had stolen a set of pencils to draw Steamboat Willie, we'd
1113 have no hesitation in condemning that taking as wrong
— even though
1114 trivial, even if unnoticed. Yet there was nothing wrong, at least under the
1115 law of the day, with Disney's taking from Buster Keaton or from the Brothers
1116 Grimm. There was nothing wrong with the taking from Keaton because Disney's
1117 use would have been considered "fair." There was nothing wrong with the
1118 taking from the Grimms because the Grimms' work was in the public domain.
1121 Thus, even though the things that Disney took
—or more generally, the
1122 things taken by anyone exercising Walt Disney creativity
—are valuable,
1123 our tradition does not treat those takings as wrong. Some things remain free
1124 for the taking within a free culture, and that freedom is good.
1126 The same with the doujinshi culture. If a doujinshi artist broke into a
1127 publisher's office and ran off with a thousand copies of his latest
1128 work
—or even one copy
—without paying, we'd have no hesitation in
1129 saying the artist was wrong. In addition to having trespassed, he would have
1130 stolen something of value. The law bans that stealing in whatever form,
1131 whether large or small.
1133 Yet there is an obvious reluctance, even among Japanese lawyers, to say that
1134 the copycat comic artists are "stealing." This form of Walt Disney
1135 creativity is seen as fair and right, even if lawyers in particular find it
1138 It's the same with a thousand examples that appear everywhere once you begin
1139 to look. Scientists build upon the work of other scientists without asking
1140 or paying for the privilege. ("Excuse me, Professor Einstein, but may I have
1141 permission to use your theory of relativity to show that you were wrong
1142 about quantum physics?") Acting companies perform adaptations of the works
1143 of Shakespeare without securing permission from anyone. (Does
1144 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>anyone
</em></span> believe Shakespeare would be better spread
1145 within our culture if there were a central Shakespeare rights clearinghouse
1146 that all productions of Shakespeare must appeal to first?) And Hollywood
1147 goes through cycles with a certain kind of movie: five asteroid films in the
1148 late
1990s; two volcano disaster films in
1997.
1151 Creators here and everywhere are always and at all times building upon the
1152 creativity that went before and that surrounds them now. That building is
1153 always and everywhere at least partially done without permission and without
1154 compensating the original creator. No society, free or controlled, has ever
1155 demanded that every use be paid for or that permission for Walt Disney
1156 creativity must always be sought. Instead, every society has left a certain
1157 bit of its culture free for the taking
—free societies more fully than
1158 unfree, perhaps, but all societies to some degree.
1161 The hard question is therefore not
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>whether
</em></span> a culture is
1162 free. All cultures are free to some degree. The hard question instead is
1163 "
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>How
</em></span> free is this culture?" How much, and how broadly,
1164 is the culture free for others to take and build upon? Is that freedom
1165 limited to party members? To members of the royal family? To the top ten
1166 corporations on the New York Stock Exchange? Or is that freedom spread
1167 broadly? To artists generally, whether affiliated with the Met or not? To
1168 musicians generally, whether white or not? To filmmakers generally, whether
1169 affiliated with a studio or not?
1171 Frie kulturer er kulturer som etterlater mye åpent for andre å bygge på.
1172 Ufrie, eller tillatelse-kulturer etterlater mye mindre. Vår var en fri
1173 kultur. Den er på tur til å bli mindre fri.
1174 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2948298" href=
"#id2948298" class=
"para">19</a>]
</sup>
1177 Leonard Maltin,
<em class=
"citetitle">Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated
1178 Cartoons
</em> (New York: Penguin Books,
1987),
34–35.
1179 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2948391" href=
"#id2948391" class=
"para">20</a>]
</sup>
1182 Jeg er takknemlig overfor David Gerstein og hans nøyaktige historie,
1183 beskrevet på
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
4</a>. I
1184 følge Dave Smith ved the Disney Archives, betalte Disney for å bruke
1185 musikken til fem sanger i
<em class=
"citetitle">Steamboat Willie
</em>:
1186 "Steamboat Bill," "The Simpleton" (Delille), "Mischief Makers" (Carbonara),
1187 "Joyful Hurry No.
1" (Baron), og "Gawky Rube" (Lakay). En sjette sang, "The
1188 Turkey in the Straw," var allerede allemannseie. Brev fra David Smith til
1189 Harry Surden,
10. juli
2003, tilgjenglig i arkivet til forfatteren.
1190 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2948444" href=
"#id2948444" class=
"para">21</a>]
</sup>
1193 Han var også tilhenger av allmannseiet. Se Chris Sprigman, "The Mouse that
1194 Ate the Public Domain," Findlaw,
5. mars
2002, fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
5</a>.
1195 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2948586" href=
"#id2948586" class=
"para">22</a>]
</sup>
1198 Until
1976, copyright law granted an author the possibility of two terms: an
1199 initial term and a renewal term. I have calculated the "average" term by
1200 determining the weighted average of total registrations for any particular
1201 year, and the proportion renewing. Thus, if
100 copyrights are registered in
1202 year
1, and only
15 are renewed, and the renewal term is
28 years, then the
1203 average term is
32.2 years. For the renewal data and other relevant data,
1204 see the Web site associated with this book, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
6</a>.
1205 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2948742" href=
"#id2948742" class=
"para">23</a>]
</sup>
1208 For en utmerket historie, se Scott McCloud,
<em class=
"citetitle">Reinventing
1209 Comics
</em> (New York: Perennial,
2000).
1210 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2948893" href=
"#id2948893" class=
"para">24</a>]
</sup>
1213 See Salil K. Mehra, "Copyright and Comics in Japan: Does Law Explain Why All
1214 the Comics My Kid Watches Are Japanese Imports?"
<em class=
"citetitle">Rutgers Law
1215 Review
</em> 55 (
2002):
155,
182.
"[T]here might be a collective
1216 economic rationality that would lead manga and anime artists to forgo
1217 bringing legal actions for infringement. One hypothesis is that all manga
1218 artists may be better off collectively if they set aside their individual
1219 self-interest and decide not to press their legal rights. This is
1220 essentially a prisoner's dilemma solved."
1221 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2948961" href=
"#id2948961" class=
"para">25</a>]
</sup>
1223 The term
<em class=
"citetitle">intellectual property
</em> is of relatively
1224 recent origin. See Siva Vaidhyanathan,
<em class=
"citetitle">Copyrights and
1225 Copywrongs
</em>,
11 (New York: New York University Press,
2001). See
1226 also Lawrence Lessig,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Future of Ideas
</em> (New York:
1227 Random House,
2001),
293 n.
26. The term accurately describes a set of
1228 "property" rights
—copyright, patents, trademark, and
1229 trade-secret
—but the nature of those rights is very different.
1230 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2948978"></a>
1231 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title='Kapittel
3. Kapittel to:
"Kun etter-apere"'
><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"mere-copyists"></a>Kapittel
3. Kapittel to: "Kun etter-apere"
</h2></div></div></div><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949113"></a><p>
1232 In
1839, Louis Daguerre invented the first practical technology for
1233 producing what we would call "photographs." Appropriately enough, they were
1234 called "daguerreotypes." The process was complicated and expensive, and the
1235 field was thus limited to professionals and a few zealous and wealthy
1236 amateurs. (There was even an American Daguerre Association that helped
1237 regulate the industry, as do all such associations, by keeping competition
1238 down so as to keep prices up.)
1240 Yet despite high prices, the demand for daguerreotypes was strong. This
1241 pushed inventors to find simpler and cheaper ways to make "automatic
1242 pictures." William Talbot soon discovered a process for making "negatives."
1243 But because the negatives were glass, and had to be kept wet, the process
1244 still remained expensive and cumbersome. In the
1870s, dry plates were
1245 developed, making it easier to separate the taking of a picture from its
1246 developing. These were still plates of glass, and thus it was still not a
1247 process within reach of most amateurs.
1248 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxeastmangeorge"></a><p>
1250 The technological change that made mass photography possible didn't happen
1251 until
1888, and was the creation of a single man. George Eastman, himself an
1252 amateur photographer, was frustrated by the technology of photographs made
1253 with plates. In a flash of insight (so to speak), Eastman saw that if the
1254 film could be made to be flexible, it could be held on a single
1255 spindle. That roll could then be sent to a developer, driving the costs of
1256 photography down substantially. By lowering the costs, Eastman expected he
1257 could dramatically broaden the population of photographers.
1259 Eastman developed flexible, emulsion-coated paper film and placed rolls of
1260 it in small, simple cameras: the Kodak. The device was marketed on the basis
1261 of its simplicity. "You press the button and we do the rest."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949184" href=
"#ftn.id2949184" class=
"footnote">26</a>]
</sup> As he described in
<em class=
"citetitle">The Kodak
1263 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
1264 The principle of the Kodak system is the separation of the work that any
1265 person whomsoever can do in making a photograph, from the work that only an
1266 expert can do. . . . We furnish anybody, man, woman or child, who has
1267 sufficient intelligence to point a box straight and press a button, with an
1268 instrument which altogether removes from the practice of photography the
1269 necessity for exceptional facilities or, in fact, any special knowledge of
1270 the art. It can be employed without preliminary study, without a darkroom
1271 and without chemicals.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949213" href=
"#ftn.id2949213" class=
"footnote">27</a>]
</sup>
1272 </p></blockquote></div><p>
1273 For $
25, anyone could make pictures. The camera came preloaded with film,
1274 and when it had been used, the camera was returned to an Eastman factory,
1275 where the film was developed. Over time, of course, the cost of the camera
1276 and the ease with which it could be used both improved. Roll film thus
1277 became the basis for the explosive growth of popular photography. Eastman's
1278 camera first went on sale in
1888; one year later, Kodak was printing more
1279 than six thousand negatives a day. From
1888 through
1909, while industrial
1280 production was rising by
4.7 percent, photographic equipment and material
1281 sales increased by percent.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949245" href=
"#ftn.id2949245" class=
"footnote">28</a>]
</sup> Eastman
1282 Kodak's sales during the same period experienced an average annual increase
1283 of over
17 percent.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949254" href=
"#ftn.id2949254" class=
"footnote">29</a>]
</sup>
1284 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949263"></a><p>
1287 The real significance of Eastman's invention, however, was not economic. It
1288 was social. Professional photography gave individuals a glimpse of places
1289 they would never otherwise see. Amateur photography gave them the ability to
1290 record their own lives in a way they had never been able to do before. As
1291 author Brian Coe notes, "For the first time the snapshot album provided the
1292 man on the street with a permanent record of his family and its
1293 activities. . . . For the first time in history there exists an authentic
1294 visual record of the appearance and activities of the common man made
1295 without [literary] interpretation or bias."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949292" href=
"#ftn.id2949292" class=
"footnote">30</a>]
</sup>
1297 In this way, the Kodak camera and film were technologies of expression. The
1298 pencil or paintbrush was also a technology of expression, of course. But it
1299 took years of training before they could be deployed by amateurs in any
1300 useful or effective way. With the Kodak, expression was possible much sooner
1301 and more simply. The barrier to expression was lowered. Snobs would sneer at
1302 its "quality"; professionals would discount it as irrelevant. But watch a
1303 child study how best to frame a picture and you get a sense of the
1304 experience of creativity that the Kodak enabled. Democratic tools gave
1305 ordinary people a way to express themselves more easily than any tools could
1308 What was required for this technology to flourish? Obviously, Eastman's
1309 genius was an important part. But also important was the legal environment
1310 within which Eastman's invention grew. For early in the history of
1311 photography, there was a series of judicial decisions that could well have
1312 changed the course of photography substantially. Courts were asked whether
1313 the photographer, amateur or professional, required permission before he
1314 could capture and print whatever image he wanted. Their answer was
1315 no.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949327" href=
"#ftn.id2949327" class=
"footnote">31</a>]
</sup>
1318 The arguments in favor of requiring permission will sound surprisingly
1319 familiar. The photographer was "taking" something from the person or
1320 building whose photograph he shot
—pirating something of value. Some
1321 even thought he was taking the target's soul. Just as Disney was not free to
1322 take the pencils that his animators used to draw Mickey, so, too, should
1323 these photographers not be free to take images that they thought valuable.
1324 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949360"></a><p>
1325 On the other side was an argument that should be familiar, as well. Sure,
1326 there may be something of value being used. But citizens should have the
1327 right to capture at least those images that stand in public view. (Louis
1328 Brandeis, who would become a Supreme Court Justice, thought the rule should
1329 be different for images from private spaces.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949383" href=
"#ftn.id2949383" class=
"footnote">32</a>]
</sup>) It may be that this means that the photographer gets something for
1330 nothing. Just as Disney could take inspiration from
<em class=
"citetitle">Steamboat
1331 Bill, Jr
</em>. or the Brothers Grimm, the photographer should be free
1332 to capture an image without compensating the source.
1334 Fortunately for Mr. Eastman, and for photography in general, these early
1335 decisions went in favor of the pirates. In general, no permission would be
1336 required before an image could be captured and shared with others. Instead,
1337 permission was presumed. Freedom was the default. (The law would eventually
1338 craft an exception for famous people: commercial photographers who snap
1339 pictures of famous people for commercial purposes have more restrictions
1340 than the rest of us. But in the ordinary case, the image can be captured
1341 without clearing the rights to do the capturing.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949428" href=
"#ftn.id2949428" class=
"footnote">33</a>]
</sup>)
1343 We can only speculate about how photography would have developed had the law
1344 gone the other way. If the presumption had been against the photographer,
1345 then the photographer would have had to demonstrate permission. Perhaps
1346 Eastman Kodak would have had to demonstrate permission, too, before it
1347 developed the film upon which images were captured. After all, if permission
1348 were not granted, then Eastman Kodak would be benefiting from the "theft"
1349 committed by the photographer. Just as Napster benefited from the copyright
1350 infringements committed by Napster users, Kodak would be benefiting from the
1351 "image-right" infringement of its photographers. We could imagine the law
1352 then requiring that some form of permission be demonstrated before a company
1353 developed pictures. We could imagine a system developing to demonstrate that
1359 But though we could imagine this system of permission, it would be very hard
1360 to see how photography could have flourished as it did if the requirement
1361 for permission had been built into the rules that govern it. Photography
1362 would have existed. It would have grown in importance over
1363 time. Professionals would have continued to use the technology as they
1364 did
—since professionals could have more easily borne the burdens of
1365 the permission system. But the spread of photography to ordinary people
1366 would not have occurred. Nothing like that growth would have been
1367 realized. And certainly, nothing like that growth in a democratic technology
1368 of expression would have been realized. If you drive through San
1369 Francisco's Presidio, you might see two gaudy yellow school buses painted
1370 over with colorful and striking images, and the logo "Just Think!" in place
1371 of the name of a school. But there's little that's "just" cerebral in the
1372 projects that these busses enable. These buses are filled with technologies
1373 that teach kids to tinker with film. Not the film of Eastman. Not even the
1374 film of your VCR. Rather the "film" of digital cameras. Just Think! is a
1375 project that enables kids to make films, as a way to understand and critique
1376 the filmed culture that they find all around them. Each year, these busses
1377 travel to more than thirty schools and enable three hundred to five hundred
1378 children to learn something about media by doing something with media. By
1379 doing, they think. By tinkering, they learn.
1380 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949474"></a><p>
1381 These buses are not cheap, but the technology they carry is increasingly
1382 so. The cost of a high-quality digital video system has fallen
1383 dramatically. As one analyst puts it, "Five years ago, a good real-time
1384 digital video editing system cost $
25,
000. Today you can get professional
1385 quality for $
595."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949518" href=
"#ftn.id2949518" class=
"footnote">34</a>]
</sup> These buses are
1386 filled with technology that would have cost hundreds of thousands just ten
1387 years ago. And it is now feasible to imagine not just buses like this, but
1388 classrooms across the country where kids are learning more and more of
1389 something teachers call "media literacy."
1392 "Media literacy," as Dave Yanofsky, the executive director of Just Think!,
1393 puts it, "is the ability . . . to understand, analyze, and deconstruct media
1394 images. Its aim is to make [kids] literate about the way media works, the
1395 way it's constructed, the way it's delivered, and the way people access it."
1396 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949546"></a>
1398 This may seem like an odd way to think about "literacy." For most people,
1399 literacy is about reading and writing. Faulkner and Hemingway and noticing
1400 split infinitives are the things that "literate" people know about.
1402 Maybe. But in a world where children see on average
390 hours of television
1403 commercials per year, or between
20,
000 and
45,
000 commercials
1404 generally,
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949568" href=
"#ftn.id2949568" class=
"footnote">35</a>]
</sup> it is increasingly important
1405 to understand the "grammar" of media. For just as there is a grammar for the
1406 written word, so, too, is there one for media. And just as kids learn how to
1407 write by writing lots of terrible prose, kids learn how to write media by
1408 constructing lots of (at least at first) terrible media.
1410 A growing field of academics and activists sees this form of literacy as
1411 crucial to the next generation of culture. For though anyone who has written
1412 understands how difficult writing is
—how difficult it is to sequence
1413 the story, to keep a reader's attention, to craft language to be
1414 understandable
—few of us have any real sense of how difficult media
1415 is. Or more fundamentally, few of us have a sense of how media works, how it
1416 holds an audience or leads it through a story, how it triggers emotion or
1419 It took filmmaking a generation before it could do these things well. But
1420 even then, the knowledge was in the filming, not in writing about the
1421 film. The skill came from experiencing the making of a film, not from
1422 reading a book about it. One learns to write by writing and then reflecting
1423 upon what one has written. One learns to write with images by making them
1424 and then reflecting upon what one has created.
1425 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949612"></a><p>
1426 This grammar has changed as media has changed. When it was just film, as
1427 Elizabeth Daley, executive director of the University of Southern
1428 California's Annenberg Center for Communication and dean of the USC School
1429 of Cinema-Television, explained to me, the grammar was about "the placement
1430 of objects, color, . . . rhythm, pacing, and texture."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949626" href=
"#ftn.id2949626" class=
"footnote">36</a>]
</sup> But as computers open up an interactive space where
1431 a story is "played" as well as experienced, that grammar changes. The simple
1432 control of narrative is lost, and so other techniques are necessary. Author
1433 Michael Crichton had mastered the narrative of science fiction. But when he
1434 tried to design a computer game based on one of his works, it was a new
1435 craft he had to learn. How to lead people through a game without their
1436 feeling they have been led was not obvious, even to a wildly successful
1437 author.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949658" href=
"#ftn.id2949658" class=
"footnote">37</a>]
</sup>
1438 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949680"></a><p>
1439 This skill is precisely the craft a filmmaker learns. As Daley describes,
1440 "people are very surprised about how they are led through a film. [I]t is
1441 perfectly constructed to keep you from seeing it, so you have no idea. If a
1442 filmmaker succeeds you do not know how you were led." If you know you were
1443 led through a film, the film has failed.
1445 Yet the push for an expanded literacy
—one that goes beyond text to
1446 include audio and visual elements
—is not about making better film
1447 directors. The aim is not to improve the profession of filmmaking at all.
1448 Instead, as Daley explained,
1449 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
1450 From my perspective, probably the most important digital divide is not
1451 access to a box. It's the ability to be empowered with the language that
1452 that box works in. Otherwise only a very few people can write with this
1453 language, and all the rest of us are reduced to being read-only.
1454 </p></blockquote></div><p>
1455 "Read-only." Passive recipients of culture produced elsewhere. Couch
1456 potatoes. Consumers. This is the world of media from the twentieth century.
1458 The twenty-first century could be different. This is the crucial point: It
1459 could be both read and write. Or at least reading and better understanding
1460 the craft of writing. Or best, reading and understanding the tools that
1461 enable the writing to lead or mislead. The aim of any literacy, and this
1462 literacy in particular, is to "empower people to choose the appropriate
1463 language for what they need to create or express."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949729" href=
"#ftn.id2949729" class=
"footnote">38</a>]
</sup> It is to enable students "to communicate in the
1464 language of the twenty-first century."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949747" href=
"#ftn.id2949747" class=
"footnote">39</a>]
</sup>
1465 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949755"></a><p>
1466 As with any language, this language comes more easily to some than to
1467 others. It doesn't necessarily come more easily to those who excel in
1468 written language. Daley and Stephanie Barish, director of the Institute for
1469 Multimedia Literacy at the Annenberg Center, describe one particularly
1470 poignant example of a project they ran in a high school. The high school
1471 was a very poor inner-city Los Angeles school. In all the traditional
1472 measures of success, this school was a failure. But Daley and Barish ran a
1473 program that gave kids an opportunity to use film to express meaning about
1474 something the students know something about
—gun violence.
1476 The class was held on Friday afternoons, and it created a relatively new
1477 problem for the school. While the challenge in most classes was getting the
1478 kids to come, the challenge in this class was keeping them away. The "kids
1479 were showing up at
6 A.M. and leaving at
5 at night," said Barish. They were
1480 working harder than in any other class to do what education should be
1481 about
—learning how to express themselves.
1483 Using whatever "free web stuff they could find," and relatively simple tools
1484 to enable the kids to mix "image, sound, and text," Barish said this class
1485 produced a series of projects that showed something about gun violence that
1486 few would otherwise understand. This was an issue close to the lives of
1487 these students. The project "gave them a tool and empowered them to be able
1488 to both understand it and talk about it," Barish explained. That tool
1489 succeeded in creating expression
—far more successfully and powerfully
1490 than could have been created using only text. "If you had said to these
1491 students, `you have to do it in text,' they would've just thrown their hands
1492 up and gone and done something else," Barish described, in part, no doubt,
1493 because expressing themselves in text is not something these students can do
1494 well. Yet neither is text a form in which
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>these
</em></span> ideas
1495 can be expressed well. The power of this message depended upon its
1496 connection to this form of expression.
1501 "But isn't education about teaching kids to write?" I asked. In part, of
1502 course, it is. But why are we teaching kids to write? Education, Daley
1503 explained, is about giving students a way of "constructing meaning." To say
1504 that that means just writing is like saying teaching writing is only about
1505 teaching kids how to spell. Text is one part
—and increasingly, not the
1506 most powerful part
—of constructing meaning. As Daley explained in the
1507 most moving part of our interview,
1508 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
1509 What you want is to give these students ways of constructing meaning. If all
1510 you give them is text, they're not going to do it. Because they can't. You
1511 know, you've got Johnny who can look at a video, he can play a video game,
1512 he can do graffiti all over your walls, he can take your car apart, and he
1513 can do all sorts of other things. He just can't read your text. So Johnny
1514 comes to school and you say, "Johnny, you're illiterate. Nothing you can do
1515 matters." Well, Johnny then has two choices: He can dismiss you or he [can]
1516 dismiss himself. If his ego is healthy at all, he's going to dismiss
1517 you. [But i]nstead, if you say, "Well, with all these things that you can
1518 do, let's talk about this issue. Play for me music that you think reflects
1519 that, or show me images that you think reflect that, or draw for me
1520 something that reflects that." Not by giving a kid a video camera and
1521 . . . saying, "Let's go have fun with the video camera and make a little
1522 movie." But instead, really help you take these elements that you
1523 understand, that are your language, and construct meaning about the
1526 That empowers enormously. And then what happens, of course, is eventually,
1527 as it has happened in all these classes, they bump up against the fact, "I
1528 need to explain this and I really need to write something." And as one of
1529 the teachers told Stephanie, they would rewrite a paragraph
5,
6,
7,
8
1530 times, till they got it right.
1533 Because they needed to. There was a reason for doing it. They needed to say
1534 something, as opposed to just jumping through your hoops. They actually
1535 needed to use a language that they didn't speak very well. But they had come
1536 to understand that they had a lot of power with this language."
1537 </p></blockquote></div><p>
1538 When two planes crashed into the World Trade Center, another into the
1539 Pentagon, and a fourth into a Pennsylvania field, all media around the world
1540 shifted to this news. Every moment of just about every day for that week,
1541 and for weeks after, television in particular, and media generally, retold
1542 the story of the events we had just witnessed. The telling was a retelling,
1543 because we had seen the events that were described. The genius of this awful
1544 act of terrorism was that the delayed second attack was perfectly timed to
1545 assure that the whole world would be watching.
1547 These retellings had an increasingly familiar feel. There was music scored
1548 for the intermissions, and fancy graphics that flashed across the
1549 screen. There was a formula to interviews. There was "balance," and
1550 seriousness. This was news choreographed in the way we have increasingly
1551 come to expect it, "news as entertainment," even if the entertainment is
1553 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949890"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949895"></a><p>
1554 But in addition to this produced news about the "tragedy of September
11,"
1555 those of us tied to the Internet came to see a very different production as
1556 well. The Internet was filled with accounts of the same events. Yet these
1557 Internet accounts had a very different flavor. Some people constructed photo
1558 pages that captured images from around the world and presented them as slide
1559 shows with text. Some offered open letters. There were sound
1560 recordings. There was anger and frustration. There were attempts to provide
1561 context. There was, in short, an extraordinary worldwide barn raising, in
1562 the sense Mike Godwin uses the term in his book
<em class=
"citetitle">Cyber
1563 Rights
</em>, around a news event that had captured the attention of
1564 the world. There was ABC and CBS, but there was also the Internet.
1567 I don't mean simply to praise the Internet
—though I do think the
1568 people who supported this form of speech should be praised. I mean instead
1569 to point to a significance in this form of speech. For like a Kodak, the
1570 Internet enables people to capture images. And like in a movie by a student
1571 on the "Just Think!" bus, the visual images could be mixed with sound or
1574 But unlike any technology for simply capturing images, the Internet allows
1575 these creations to be shared with an extraordinary number of people,
1576 practically instantaneously. This is something new in our
1577 tradition
—not just that culture can be captured mechanically, and
1578 obviously not just that events are commented upon critically, but that this
1579 mix of captured images, sound, and commentary can be widely spread
1580 practically instantaneously.
1582 September
11 was not an aberration. It was a beginning. Around the same
1583 time, a form of communication that has grown dramatically was just beginning
1584 to come into public consciousness: the Web-log, or blog. The blog is a kind
1585 of public diary, and within some cultures, such as in Japan, it functions
1586 very much like a diary. In those cultures, it records private facts in a
1587 public way
—it's a kind of electronic
<em class=
"citetitle">Jerry
1588 Springer
</em>, available anywhere in the world.
1590 But in the United States, blogs have taken on a very different character.
1591 There are some who use the space simply to talk about their private
1592 life. But there are many who use the space to engage in public
1593 discourse. Discussing matters of public import, criticizing others who are
1594 mistaken in their views, criticizing politicians about the decisions they
1595 make, offering solutions to problems we all see: blogs create the sense of a
1596 virtual public meeting, but one in which we don't all hope to be there at
1597 the same time and in which conversations are not necessarily linked. The
1598 best of the blog entries are relatively short; they point directly to words
1599 used by others, criticizing with or adding to them. They are arguably the
1600 most important form of unchoreographed public discourse that we have.
1603 That's a strong statement. Yet it says as much about our democracy as it
1604 does about blogs. This is the part of America that is most difficult for
1605 those of us who love America to accept: Our democracy has atrophied. Of
1606 course we have elections, and most of the time the courts allow those
1607 elections to count. A relatively small number of people vote in those
1608 elections. The cycle of these elections has become totally professionalized
1609 and routinized. Most of us think this is democracy.
1611 But democracy has never just been about elections. Democracy means rule by
1612 the people, but rule means something more than mere elections. In our
1613 tradition, it also means control through reasoned discourse. This was the
1614 idea that captured the imagination of Alexis de Tocqueville, the
1615 nineteenth-century French lawyer who wrote the most important account of
1616 early "Democracy in America." It wasn't popular elections that fascinated
1617 him
—it was the jury, an institution that gave ordinary people the
1618 right to choose life or death for other citizens. And most fascinating for
1619 him was that the jury didn't just vote about the outcome they would
1620 impose. They deliberated. Members argued about the "right" result; they
1621 tried to persuade each other of the "right" result, and in criminal cases at
1622 least, they had to agree upon a unanimous result for the process to come to
1623 an end.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949937" href=
"#ftn.id2949937" class=
"footnote">40</a>]
</sup>
1625 Yet even this institution flags in American life today. And in its place,
1626 there is no systematic effort to enable citizen deliberation. Some are
1627 pushing to create just such an institution.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950023" href=
"#ftn.id2950023" class=
"footnote">41</a>]
</sup> And in some towns in New England, something close to deliberation
1628 remains. But for most of us for most of the time, there is no time or place
1629 for "democratic deliberation" to occur.
1631 More bizarrely, there is generally not even permission for it to occur. We,
1632 the most powerful democracy in the world, have developed a strong norm
1633 against talking about politics. It's fine to talk about politics with people
1634 you agree with. But it is rude to argue about politics with people you
1635 disagree with. Political discourse becomes isolated, and isolated discourse
1636 becomes more extreme.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950047" href=
"#ftn.id2950047" class=
"footnote">42</a>]
</sup> We say what our
1637 friends want to hear, and hear very little beyond what our friends say.
1640 Enter the blog. The blog's very architecture solves one part of this
1641 problem. People post when they want to post, and people read when they want
1642 to read. The most difficult time is synchronous time. Technologies that
1643 enable asynchronous communication, such as e-mail, increase the opportunity
1644 for communication. Blogs allow for public discourse without the public ever
1645 needing to gather in a single public place.
1647 But beyond architecture, blogs also have solved the problem of
1648 norms. There's no norm (yet) in blog space not to talk about politics.
1649 Indeed, the space is filled with political speech, on both the right and the
1650 left. Some of the most popular sites are conservative or libertarian, but
1651 there are many of all political stripes. And even blogs that are not
1652 political cover political issues when the occasion merits.
1654 The significance of these blogs is tiny now, though not so tiny. The name
1655 Howard Dean may well have faded from the
2004 presidential race but for
1656 blogs. Yet even if the number of readers is small, the reading is having an
1657 effect.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2950091"></a>
1659 One direct effect is on stories that had a different life cycle in the
1660 mainstream media. The Trent Lott affair is an example. When Lott "misspoke"
1661 at a party for Senator Strom Thurmond, essentially praising Thurmond's
1662 segregationist policies, he calculated correctly that this story would
1663 disappear from the mainstream press within forty-eight hours. It did. But he
1664 didn't calculate its life cycle in blog space. The bloggers kept researching
1665 the story. Over time, more and more instances of the same "misspeaking"
1666 emerged. Finally, the story broke back into the mainstream press. In the
1667 end, Lott was forced to resign as senate majority leader.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950110" href=
"#ftn.id2950110" class=
"footnote">43</a>]
</sup> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2950118"></a>
1669 This different cycle is possible because the same commercial pressures don't
1670 exist with blogs as with other ventures. Television and newspapers are
1671 commercial entities. They must work to keep attention. If they lose
1672 readers, they lose revenue. Like sharks, they must move on.
1674 But bloggers don't have a similar constraint. They can obsess, they can
1675 focus, they can get serious. If a particular blogger writes a particularly
1676 interesting story, more and more people link to that story. And as the
1677 number of links to a particular story increases, it rises in the ranks of
1678 stories. People read what is popular; what is popular has been selected by a
1679 very democratic process of peer-generated rankings.
1680 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxwinerdave"></a><p>
1682 There's a second way, as well, in which blogs have a different cycle from
1683 the mainstream press. As Dave Winer, one of the fathers of this movement and
1684 a software author for many decades, told me, another difference is the
1685 absence of a financial "conflict of interest." "I think you have to take the
1686 conflict of interest" out of journalism, Winer told me. "An amateur
1687 journalist simply doesn't have a conflict of interest, or the conflict of
1688 interest is so easily disclosed that you know you can sort of get it out of
1690 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2950171"></a><p>
1691 These conflicts become more important as media becomes more concentrated
1692 (more on this below). A concentrated media can hide more from the public
1693 than an unconcentrated media can
—as CNN admitted it did after the Iraq
1694 war because it was afraid of the consequences to its own
1695 employees.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2949998" href=
"#ftn.id2949998" class=
"footnote">44</a>]
</sup> It also needs to sustain a
1696 more coherent account. (In the middle of the Iraq war, I read a post on the
1697 Internet from someone who was at that time listening to a satellite uplink
1698 with a reporter in Iraq. The New York headquarters was telling the reporter
1699 over and over that her account of the war was too bleak: She needed to offer
1700 a more optimistic story. When she told New York that wasn't warranted, they
1701 told her
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>that
</em></span> they were writing "the story.")
1702 </p><p> Blog space gives amateurs a way to enter the debate
—"amateur" not in
1703 the sense of inexperienced, but in the sense of an Olympic athlete, meaning
1704 not paid by anyone to give their reports. It allows for a much broader range
1705 of input into a story, as reporting on the Columbia disaster revealed, when
1706 hundreds from across the southwest United States turned to the Internet to
1707 retell what they had seen.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950206" href=
"#ftn.id2950206" class=
"footnote">45</a>]
</sup> And it
1708 drives readers to read across the range of accounts and "triangulate," as
1709 Winer puts it, the truth. Blogs, Winer says, are "communicating directly
1710 with our constituency, and the middle man is out of it"
—with all the
1711 benefits, and costs, that might entail.
1714 Winer is optimistic about the future of journalism infected with
1715 blogs. "It's going to become an essential skill," Winer predicts, for public
1716 figures and increasingly for private figures as well. It's not clear that
1717 "journalism" is happy about this
—some journalists have been told to
1718 curtail their blogging.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950236" href=
"#ftn.id2950236" class=
"footnote">46</a>]
</sup> But it is clear
1719 that we are still in transition. "A lot of what we are doing now is warm-up
1720 exercises," Winer told me. There is a lot that must mature before this
1721 space has its mature effect. And as the inclusion of content in this space
1722 is the least infringing use of the Internet (meaning infringing on
1723 copyright), Winer said, "we will be the last thing that gets shut down."
1725 This speech affects democracy. Winer thinks that happens because "you don't
1726 have to work for somebody who controls, [for] a gatekeeper." That is
1727 true. But it affects democracy in another way as well. As more and more
1728 citizens express what they think, and defend it in writing, that will change
1729 the way people understand public issues. It is easy to be wrong and
1730 misguided in your head. It is harder when the product of your mind can be
1731 criticized by others. Of course, it is a rare human who admits that he has
1732 been persuaded that he is wrong. But it is even rarer for a human to ignore
1733 when he has been proven wrong. The writing of ideas, arguments, and
1734 criticism improves democracy. Today there are probably a couple of million
1735 blogs where such writing happens. When there are ten million, there will be
1736 something extraordinary to report.
1737 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2950316"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxbrownjohnseely"></a><p>
1738 John Seely Brown is the chief scientist of the Xerox Corporation. His work,
1739 as his Web site describes it, is "human learning and . . . the creation of
1740 knowledge ecologies for creating . . . innovation."
1742 Brown thus looks at these technologies of digital creativity a bit
1743 differently from the perspectives I've sketched so far. I'm sure he would be
1744 excited about any technology that might improve democracy. But his real
1745 excitement comes from how these technologies affect learning.
1748 As Brown believes, we learn by tinkering. When "a lot of us grew up," he
1749 explains, that tinkering was done "on motorcycle engines, lawnmower engines,
1750 automobiles, radios, and so on." But digital technologies enable a different
1751 kind of tinkering
—with abstract ideas though in concrete form. The
1752 kids at Just Think! not only think about how a commercial portrays a
1753 politician; using digital technology, they can take the commercial apart and
1754 manipulate it, tinker with it to see how it does what it does. Digital
1755 technologies launch a kind of bricolage, or "free collage," as Brown calls
1756 it. Many get to add to or transform the tinkering of many others.
1758 The best large-scale example of this kind of tinkering so far is free
1759 software or open-source software (FS/OSS). FS/OSS is software whose source
1760 code is shared. Anyone can download the technology that makes a FS/OSS
1761 program run. And anyone eager to learn how a particular bit of FS/OSS
1762 technology works can tinker with the code.
1764 This opportunity creates a "completely new kind of learning platform," as
1765 Brown describes. "As soon as you start doing that, you . . . unleash a free
1766 collage on the community, so that other people can start looking at your
1767 code, tinkering with it, trying it out, seeing if they can improve it." Each
1768 effort is a kind of apprenticeship. "Open source becomes a major
1769 apprenticeship platform."
1771 In this process, "the concrete things you tinker with are abstract. They
1772 are code." Kids are "shifting to the ability to tinker in the abstract, and
1773 this tinkering is no longer an isolated activity that you're doing in your
1774 garage. You are tinkering with a community platform. . . . You are
1775 tinkering with other people's stuff. The more you tinker the more you
1776 improve." The more you improve, the more you learn.
1778 This same thing happens with content, too. And it happens in the same
1779 collaborative way when that content is part of the Web. As Brown puts it,
1780 "the Web [is] the first medium that truly honors multiple forms of
1781 intelligence." Earlier technologies, such as the typewriter or word
1782 processors, helped amplify text. But the Web amplifies much more than
1783 text. "The Web . . . says if you are musical, if you are artistic, if you
1784 are visual, if you are interested in film . . . [then] there is a lot you
1785 can start to do on this medium. [It] can now amplify and honor these
1786 multiple forms of intelligence."
1787 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2950410"></a><p>
1789 Brown is talking about what Elizabeth Daley, Stephanie Barish, and Just
1790 Think! teach: that this tinkering with culture teaches as well as
1791 creates. It develops talents differently, and it builds a different kind of
1794 Yet the freedom to tinker with these objects is not guaranteed. Indeed, as
1795 we'll see through the course of this book, that freedom is increasingly
1796 highly contested. While there's no doubt that your father had the right to
1797 tinker with the car engine, there's great doubt that your child will have
1798 the right to tinker with the images she finds all around. The law and,
1799 increasingly, technology interfere with a freedom that technology, and
1800 curiosity, would otherwise ensure.
1802 These restrictions have become the focus of researchers and scholars.
1803 Professor Ed Felten of Princeton (whom we'll see more of in chapter
10) has
1804 developed a powerful argument in favor of the "right to tinker" as it
1805 applies to computer science and to knowledge in general.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950444" href=
"#ftn.id2950444" class=
"footnote">47</a>]
</sup> But Brown's concern is earlier, or younger, or more
1806 fundamental. It is about the learning that kids can do, or can't do, because
1809 "This is where education in the twenty-first century is going," Brown
1810 explains. We need to "understand how kids who grow up digital think and want
1813 "Yet," as Brown continued, and as the balance of this book will evince, "we
1814 are building a legal system that completely suppresses the natural
1815 tendencies of today's digital kids. . . . We're building an architecture
1816 that unleashes
60 percent of the brain [and] a legal system that closes down
1817 that part of the brain."
1818 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2950475"></a><p>
1819 We're building a technology that takes the magic of Kodak, mixes moving
1820 images and sound, and adds a space for commentary and an opportunity to
1821 spread that creativity everywhere. But we're building the law to close down
1824 "No way to run a culture," as Brewster Kahle, whom we'll meet in chapter
9,
1825 quipped to me in a rare moment of despondence.
1826 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949184" href=
"#id2949184" class=
"para">26</a>]
</sup>
1829 Reese V. Jenkins,
<em class=
"citetitle">Images and Enterprise
</em> (Baltimore:
1830 Johns Hopkins University Press,
1975),
112.
1831 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949213" href=
"#id2949213" class=
"para">27</a>]
</sup>
1833 Brian Coe,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Birth of Photography
</em> (New York:
1834 Taplinger Publishing,
1977),
53.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949221"></a>
1835 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949245" href=
"#id2949245" class=
"para">28</a>]
</sup>
1839 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949254" href=
"#id2949254" class=
"para">29</a>]
</sup>
1842 Basert på et diagram i Jenkins, s.
178.
1843 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949292" href=
"#id2949292" class=
"para">30</a>]
</sup>
1847 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949327" href=
"#id2949327" class=
"para">31</a>]
</sup>
1850 For illustrative cases, see, for example,
<em class=
"citetitle">Pavesich
</em>
1851 v.
<em class=
"citetitle">N.E. Life Ins. Co
</em>.,
50 S.E.
68 (Ga.
1905);
1852 <em class=
"citetitle">Foster-Milburn Co
</em>. v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Chinn
</em>,
1853 123090 S.W.
364,
366 (Ky.
1909);
<em class=
"citetitle">Corliss
</em>
1854 v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Walker
</em>,
64 F.
280 (Mass. Dist. Ct.
1894).
1855 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949383" href=
"#id2949383" class=
"para">32</a>]
</sup>
1857 Samuel D. Warren and Louis D. Brandeis, "The Right to Privacy,"
1858 <em class=
"citetitle">Harvard Law Review
</em> 4 (
1890):
193.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949392"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949400"></a>
1859 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949428" href=
"#id2949428" class=
"para">33</a>]
</sup>
1862 See Melville B. Nimmer, "The Right of Publicity,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Law and
1863 Contemporary Problems
</em> 19 (
1954):
203; William L. Prosser,
1864 "Privacy," <em class=
"citetitle">California Law Review
</em> 48 (
1960)
1865 398–407;
<em class=
"citetitle">White
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Samsung
1866 Electronics America, Inc
</em>.,
971 F.
2d
1395 (
9th Cir.
1992),
1867 cert. denied,
508 U.S.
951 (
1993).
1868 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949518" href=
"#id2949518" class=
"para">34</a>]
</sup>
1871 H. Edward Goldberg, "Essential Presentation Tools: Hardware and Software You
1872 Need to Create Digital Multimedia Presentations," cadalyst, februar
2002,
1873 tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
7</a>.
1874 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949568" href=
"#id2949568" class=
"para">35</a>]
</sup>
1877 Judith Van Evra,
<em class=
"citetitle">Television and Child Development
</em>
1878 (Hillsdale, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates,
1990); "Findings on Family
1879 and TV Study,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Denver Post
</em>,
25 May
1997, B6.
1880 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949626" href=
"#id2949626" class=
"para">36</a>]
</sup>
1882 Intervju med Elizabeth Daley og Stephanie Barish,
13. desember
2002.
1883 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949634"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949642"></a>
1884 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949658" href=
"#id2949658" class=
"para">37</a>]
</sup>
1887 Se Scott Steinberg, "Crichton Gets Medieval on PCs," E!online,
4. november
1888 2000, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
1889 #
8</a>; "Timeline,"
22. november
2000, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
9</a>.
1890 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949729" href=
"#id2949729" class=
"para">38</a>]
</sup>
1892 Intervju med Daley og Barish.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2949736"></a>
1893 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949747" href=
"#id2949747" class=
"para">39</a>]
</sup>
1897 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949937" href=
"#id2949937" class=
"para">40</a>]
</sup>
1900 See, for example, Alexis de Tocqueville,
<em class=
"citetitle">Democracy in
1901 America
</em>, bk.
1, trans. Henry Reeve (New York: Bantam Books,
1903 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950023" href=
"#id2950023" class=
"para">41</a>]
</sup>
1906 Bruce Ackerman and James Fishkin, "Deliberation Day,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Journal of
1907 Political Philosophy
</em> 10 (
2) (
2002):
129.
1908 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950047" href=
"#id2950047" class=
"para">42</a>]
</sup>
1911 Cass Sunstein,
<em class=
"citetitle">Republic.com
</em> (Princeton: Princeton
1912 University Press,
2001),
65–80,
175,
182,
183,
192.
1913 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950110" href=
"#id2950110" class=
"para">43</a>]
</sup>
1916 Noah Shachtman, "With Incessant Postings, a Pundit Stirs the Pot," New York
1917 Times,
16 January
2003, G5.
1918 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2949998" href=
"#id2949998" class=
"para">44</a>]
</sup>
1921 Telefonintervju med David Winer,
16. april
2003.
1922 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950206" href=
"#id2950206" class=
"para">45</a>]
</sup>
1925 John Schwartz, "Loss of the Shuttle: The Internet; A Wealth of Information
1926 Online,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New York Times
</em>,
2 February
2003, A28; Staci
1927 D. Kramer, "Shuttle Disaster Coverage Mixed, but Strong Overall," Online
1928 Journalism Review,
2 February
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
10</a>.
1929 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950236" href=
"#id2950236" class=
"para">46</a>]
</sup>
1931 See Michael Falcone, "Does an Editor's Pencil Ruin a Web Log?"
1932 <em class=
"citetitle">New York Times
</em>,
29 September
2003, C4. ("Not all news
1933 organizations have been as accepting of employees who blog. Kevin Sites, a
1934 CNN correspondent in Iraq who started a blog about his reporting of the war
1935 on March
9, stopped posting
12 days later at his bosses' request. Last year
1936 Steve Olafson, a
<em class=
"citetitle">Houston Chronicle
</em> reporter, was
1937 fired for keeping a personal Web log, published under a pseudonym, that
1938 dealt with some of the issues and people he was covering.")
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2950267"></a>
1939 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950444" href=
"#id2950444" class=
"para">47</a>]
</sup>
1942 See, for example, Edward Felten and Andrew Appel, "Technological Access
1943 Control Interferes with Noninfringing Scholarship,"
1944 <em class=
"citetitle">Communications of the Association for Computer
1945 Machinery
</em> 43 (
2000):
9.
1946 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 4. Kapittel tre: Kataloger"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"catalogs"></a>Kapittel
4. Kapittel tre: Kataloger
</h2></div></div></div><p>
1947 Høsten
2001, ble Jesse Jordan fra Oceanside, New York, innrullert som
1948 førsteårsstudent ved Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, i Troy, New York.
1949 Hans studieprogram ved RPI var informasjonsteknologi. Selv om han ikke var
1950 en programmerer, bestemte Jesse seg i oktober å begynne å fikle med en
1951 søkemotorteknologi som var tilgjengelig på RPI-nettverket.
1953 RPI is one of America's foremost technological research institutions. It
1954 offers degrees in fields ranging from architecture and engineering to
1955 information sciences. More than
65 percent of its five thousand
1956 undergraduates finished in the top
10 percent of their high school
1957 class. The school is thus a perfect mix of talent and experience to imagine
1958 and then build, a generation for the network age.
1960 RPI's computer network links students, faculty, and administration to one
1961 another. It also links RPI to the Internet. Not everything available on the
1962 RPI network is available on the Internet. But the network is designed to
1963 enable students to get access to the Internet, as well as more intimate
1964 access to other members of the RPI community.
1967 Search engines are a measure of a network's intimacy. Google brought the
1968 Internet much closer to all of us by fantastically improving the quality of
1969 search on the network. Specialty search engines can do this even better. The
1970 idea of "intranet" search engines, search engines that search within the
1971 network of a particular institution, is to provide users of that institution
1972 with better access to material from that institution. Businesses do this
1973 all the time, enabling employees to have access to material that people
1974 outside the business can't get. Universities do it as well.
1976 These engines are enabled by the network technology itself. Microsoft, for
1977 example, has a network file system that makes it very easy for search
1978 engines tuned to that network to query the system for information about the
1979 publicly (within that network) available content. Jesse's search engine was
1980 built to take advantage of this technology. It used Microsoft's network file
1981 system to build an index of all the files available within the RPI network.
1983 Jesse's wasn't the first search engine built for the RPI network. Indeed,
1984 his engine was a simple modification of engines that others had built. His
1985 single most important improvement over those engines was to fix a bug within
1986 the Microsoft file-sharing system that could cause a user's computer to
1987 crash. With the engines that existed before, if you tried to access a file
1988 through a Windows browser that was on a computer that was off-line, your
1989 computer could crash. Jesse modified the system a bit to fix that problem,
1990 by adding a button that a user could click to see if the machine holding the
1991 file was still on-line.
1993 Jesse's engine went on-line in late October. Over the following six months,
1994 he continued to tweak it to improve its functionality. By March, the system
1995 was functioning quite well. Jesse had more than one million files in his
1996 directory, including every type of content that might be on users'
2000 Thus the index his search engine produced included pictures, which students
2001 could use to put on their own Web sites; copies of notes or research; copies
2002 of information pamphlets; movie clips that students might have created;
2003 university brochures
—basically anything that users of the RPI network
2004 made available in a public folder of their computer.
2006 But the index also included music files. In fact, one quarter of the files
2007 that Jesse's search engine listed were music files. But that means, of
2008 course, that three quarters were not, and
—so that this point is
2009 absolutely clear
—Jesse did nothing to induce people to put music files
2010 in their public folders. He did nothing to target the search engine to these
2011 files. He was a kid tinkering with a Google-like technology at a university
2012 where he was studying information science, and hence, tinkering was the
2013 aim. Unlike Google, or Microsoft, for that matter, he made no money from
2014 this tinkering; he was not connected to any business that would make any
2015 money from this experiment. He was a kid tinkering with technology in an
2016 environment where tinkering with technology was precisely what he was
2019 On April
3,
2003, Jesse was contacted by the dean of students at RPI. The
2020 dean informed Jesse that the Recording Industry Association of America, the
2021 RIAA, would be filing a lawsuit against him and three other students whom he
2022 didn't even know, two of them at other universities. A few hours later,
2023 Jesse was served with papers from the suit. As he read these papers and
2024 watched the news reports about them, he was increasingly astonished.
2026 "It was absurd," he told me. "I don't think I did anything wrong. . . . I
2027 don't think there's anything wrong with the search engine that I ran or
2028 . . . what I had done to it. I mean, I hadn't modified it in any way that
2029 promoted or enhanced the work of pirates. I just modified the search engine
2030 in a way that would make it easier to use"
—again, a
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>search
2031 engine
</em></span>, which Jesse had not himself built, using the Windows
2032 filesharing system, which Jesse had not himself built, to enable members of
2033 the RPI community to get access to content, which Jesse had not himself
2034 created or posted, and the vast majority of which had nothing to do with
2038 But the RIAA branded Jesse a pirate. They claimed he operated a network and
2039 had therefore "willfully" violated copyright laws. They demanded that he pay
2040 them the damages for his wrong. For cases of "willful infringement," the
2041 Copyright Act specifies something lawyers call "statutory damages." These
2042 damages permit a copyright owner to claim $
150,
000 per infringement. As the
2043 RIAA alleged more than one hundred specific copyright infringements, they
2044 therefore demanded that Jesse pay them at least $
15,
000,
000.
2046 Similar lawsuits were brought against three other students: one other
2047 student at RPI, one at Michigan Technical University, and one at
2048 Princeton. Their situations were similar to Jesse's. Though each case was
2049 different in detail, the bottom line in each was exactly the same: huge
2050 demands for "damages" that the RIAA claimed it was entitled to. If you
2051 added up the claims, these four lawsuits were asking courts in the United
2052 States to award the plaintiffs close to $
100
2053 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>billion
</em></span>—six times the
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>total
</em></span>
2054 profit of the film industry in
2001.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950685" href=
"#ftn.id2950685" class=
"footnote">48</a>]
</sup>
2056 Jesse called his parents. They were supportive but a bit frightened. An
2057 uncle was a lawyer. He began negotiations with the RIAA. They demanded to
2058 know how much money Jesse had. Jesse had saved $
12,
000 from summer jobs and
2059 other employment. They demanded $
12,
000 to dismiss the case.
2061 The RIAA wanted Jesse to admit to doing something wrong. He refused. They
2062 wanted him to agree to an injunction that would essentially make it
2063 impossible for him to work in many fields of technology for the rest of his
2064 life. He refused. They made him understand that this process of being sued
2065 was not going to be pleasant. (As Jesse's father recounted to me, the chief
2066 lawyer on the case, Matt Oppenheimer, told Jesse, "You don't want to pay
2067 another visit to a dentist like me.") And throughout, the RIAA insisted it
2068 would not settle the case until it took every penny Jesse had saved.
2071 Jesse's family was outraged at these claims. They wanted to fight. But
2072 Jesse's uncle worked to educate the family about the nature of the American
2073 legal system. Jesse could fight the RIAA. He might even win. But the cost of
2074 fighting a lawsuit like this, Jesse was told, would be at least $
250,
000. If
2075 he won, he would not recover that money. If he won, he would have a piece of
2076 paper saying he had won, and a piece of paper saying he and his family were
2079 Så Jesse hadde et mafia-lignende valg: $
250,
000 og en sjanse til å vinne,
2080 eller $
12.000 og et forlik.
2082 The recording industry insists this is a matter of law and morality. Let's
2083 put the law aside for a moment and think about the morality. Where is the
2084 morality in a lawsuit like this? What is the virtue in scapegoatism? The
2085 RIAA is an extraordinarily powerful lobby. The president of the RIAA is
2086 reported to make more than $
1 million a year. Artists, on the other hand,
2087 are not well paid. The average recording artist makes $
45,
900.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950750" href=
"#ftn.id2950750" class=
"footnote">49</a>]
</sup> There are plenty of ways for the RIAA to affect and
2088 direct policy. So where is the morality in taking money from a student for
2089 running a search engine?
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950765" href=
"#ftn.id2950765" class=
"footnote">50</a>]
</sup>
2091 23. juni overførte Jesse alle sine oppsparte midler til advokaten som jobbet
2092 for RIA. Saken mot ham ble trukket. Og med dette, ble unggutten som hadde
2093 fiklet med en datamaskin og blitt saksøkt for
15 millioner dollar en
2095 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
2096 I was definitely not an activist [before]. I never really meant to be an
2097 activist. . . . [But] I've been pushed into this. In no way did I ever
2098 foresee anything like this, but I think it's just completely absurd what the
2100 </p></blockquote></div><p>
2101 Jesse's parents betray a certain pride in their reluctant activist. As his
2102 father told me, Jesse "considers himself very conservative, and so do
2103 I. . . . He's not a tree hugger. . . . I think it's bizarre that they would
2104 pick on him. But he wants to let people know that they're sending the wrong
2105 message. And he wants to correct the record."
2106 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950685" href=
"#id2950685" class=
"para">48</a>]
</sup>
2110 Tim Goral, "Recording Industry Goes After Campus P-
2-P Networks: Suit
2111 Alleges $
97.8 Billion in Damages,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Professional Media Group
2112 LCC
</em> 6 (
2003):
5, available at
2003 WL
55179443.
2113 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950750" href=
"#id2950750" class=
"para">49</a>]
</sup>
2116 Occupational Employment Survey, U.S. Dept. of Labor (
2001)
2117 (
27–2042—Musicians and Singers). See also National Endowment for
2118 the Arts,
<em class=
"citetitle">More Than One in a Blue Moon
</em> (
2000).
2119 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950765" href=
"#id2950765" class=
"para">50</a>]
</sup>
2122 Douglas Lichtman makes a related point in "KaZaA and Punishment,"
2123 <em class=
"citetitle">Wall Street Journal
</em>,
10 September
2003, A24.
2124 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title='Kapittel
5. Kapittel fire:
"Pirater"'
><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"pirates"></a>Kapittel
5. Kapittel fire: "Pirater"
</h2></div></div></div><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#film">Film
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#recordedmusic">Innspilt musikk
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#radio">Radio
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#cabletv">Kabel-TV
</a></span></dt></dl></div><p>
2125 If "piracy" means using the creative property of others without their
2126 permission
—if "if value, then right" is true
—then the history of
2127 the content industry is a history of piracy. Every important sector of "big
2128 media" today
—film, records, radio, and cable TV
—was born of a
2129 kind of piracy so defined. The consistent story is how last generation's
2130 pirates join this generation's country club
—until now.
2131 </p><div class=
"section" title=
"Film"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"film"></a>Film
</h2></div></div></div><p>
2133 The film industry of Hollywood was built by fleeing pirates.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950842" href=
"#ftn.id2950842" class=
"footnote">51</a>]
</sup> Creators and directors migrated from the East Coast
2134 to California in the early twentieth century in part to escape controls that
2135 patents granted the inventor of filmmaking, Thomas Edison. These controls
2136 were exercised through a monopoly "trust," the Motion Pictures Patents
2137 Company, and were based on Thomas Edison's creative property
—patents.
2138 Edison formed the MPPC to exercise the rights this creative property gave
2139 him, and the MPPC was serious about the control it demanded.
2141 As one commentator tells one part of the story,
2142 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
2143 A January
1909 deadline was set for all companies to comply with the
2144 license. By February, unlicensed outlaws, who referred to themselves as
2145 independents protested the trust and carried on business without submitting
2146 to the Edison monopoly. In the summer of
1909 the independent movement was
2147 in full-swing, with producers and theater owners using illegal equipment and
2148 imported film stock to create their own underground market.
2150 With the country experiencing a tremendous expansion in the number of
2151 nickelodeons, the Patents Company reacted to the independent movement by
2152 forming a strong-arm subsidiary known as the General Film Company to block
2153 the entry of non-licensed independents. With coercive tactics that have
2154 become legendary, General Film confiscated unlicensed equipment,
2155 discontinued product supply to theaters which showed unlicensed films, and
2156 effectively monopolized distribution with the acquisition of all U.S. film
2157 exchanges, except for the one owned by the independent William Fox who
2158 defied the Trust even after his license was revoked.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950900" href=
"#ftn.id2950900" class=
"footnote">52</a>]
</sup> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2950932"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2950939"></a>
2159 </p></blockquote></div><p>
2160 The Napsters of those days, the "independents," were companies like Fox. And
2161 no less than today, these independents were vigorously resisted. "Shooting
2162 was disrupted by machinery stolen, and `accidents' resulting in loss of
2163 negatives, equipment, buildings and sometimes life and limb frequently
2164 occurred."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950954" href=
"#ftn.id2950954" class=
"footnote">53</a>]
</sup> That led the independents to
2165 flee the East Coast. California was remote enough from Edison's reach that
2166 filmmakers there could pirate his inventions without fear of the law. And
2167 the leaders of Hollywood filmmaking, Fox most prominently, did just that.
2170 Of course, California grew quickly, and the effective enforcement of federal
2171 law eventually spread west. But because patents grant the patent holder a
2172 truly "limited" monopoly (just seventeen years at that time), by the time
2173 enough federal marshals appeared, the patents had expired. A new industry
2174 had been born, in part from the piracy of Edison's creative property.
2175 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Innspilt musikk"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"recordedmusic"></a>Innspilt musikk
</h2></div></div></div><p>
2176 Plateindustrien ble født av en annen type piratvirksomhet, dog for å forstå
2177 hvordan krever at en setter seg inn i detaljer om hvordan loven regulerer
2180 At the time that Edison and Henri Fourneaux invented machines for
2181 reproducing music (Edison the phonograph, Fourneaux the player piano), the
2182 law gave composers the exclusive right to control copies of their music and
2183 the exclusive right to control public performances of their music. In other
2184 words, in
1900, if I wanted a copy of Phil Russel's
1899 hit "Happy Mose,"
2185 the law said I would have to pay for the right to get a copy of the musical
2186 score, and I would also have to pay for the right to perform it publicly.
2187 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951017"></a><p>
2188 But what if I wanted to record "Happy Mose," using Edison's phonograph or
2189 Fourneaux's player piano? Here the law stumbled. It was clear enough that I
2190 would have to buy any copy of the musical score that I performed in making
2191 this recording. And it was clear enough that I would have to pay for any
2192 public performance of the work I was recording. But it wasn't totally clear
2193 that I would have to pay for a "public performance" if I recorded the song
2194 in my own house (even today, you don't owe the Beatles anything if you sing
2195 their songs in the shower), or if I recorded the song from memory (copies in
2196 your brain are not
—yet
— regulated by copyright law). So if I
2197 simply sang the song into a recording device in the privacy of my own home,
2198 it wasn't clear that I owed the composer anything. And more importantly, it
2199 wasn't clear whether I owed the composer anything if I then made copies of
2200 those recordings. Because of this gap in the law, then, I could effectively
2201 pirate someone else's song without paying its composer anything.
2204 The composers (and publishers) were none too happy about this capacity to
2205 pirate. As South Dakota senator Alfred Kittredge put it,
2206 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
2207 Imagine the injustice of the thing. A composer writes a song or an opera. A
2208 publisher buys at great expense the rights to the same and copyrights
2209 it. Along come the phonographic companies and companies who cut music rolls
2210 and deliberately steal the work of the brain of the composer and publisher
2211 without any regard for [their] rights.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951063" href=
"#ftn.id2951063" class=
"footnote">54</a>]
</sup>
2212 </p></blockquote></div><p>
2213 The innovators who developed the technology to record other people's works
2214 were "sponging upon the toil, the work, the talent, and genius of American
2215 composers,"
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951086" href=
"#ftn.id2951086" class=
"footnote">55</a>]
</sup> and the "music publishing
2216 industry" was thereby "at the complete mercy of this one
2217 pirate."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951096" href=
"#ftn.id2951096" class=
"footnote">56</a>]
</sup> As John Philip Sousa put it,
2218 in as direct a way as possible, "When they make money out of my pieces, I
2219 want a share of it."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951108" href=
"#ftn.id2951108" class=
"footnote">57</a>]
</sup>
2221 These arguments have familiar echoes in the wars of our day. So, too, do the
2222 arguments on the other side. The innovators who developed the player piano
2223 argued that "it is perfectly demonstrable that the introduction of automatic
2224 music players has not deprived any composer of anything he had before their
2225 introduction." Rather, the machines increased the sales of sheet
2226 music.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951125" href=
"#ftn.id2951125" class=
"footnote">58</a>]
</sup> In any case, the innovators
2227 argued, the job of Congress was "to consider first the interest of [the
2228 public], whom they represent, and whose servants they are." "All talk about
2229 `theft,'" the general counsel of the American Graphophone Company wrote, "is
2230 the merest claptrap, for there exists no property in ideas musical, literary
2231 or artistic, except as defined by statute."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951131" href=
"#ftn.id2951131" class=
"footnote">59</a>]
</sup>
2234 The law soon resolved this battle in favor of the composer
2235 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>and
</em></span> the recording artist. Congress amended the law to
2236 make sure that composers would be paid for the "mechanical reproductions" of
2237 their music. But rather than simply granting the composer complete control
2238 over the right to make mechanical reproductions, Congress gave recording
2239 artists a right to record the music, at a price set by Congress, once the
2240 composer allowed it to be recorded once. This is the part of copyright law
2241 that makes cover songs possible. Once a composer authorizes a recording of
2242 his song, others are free to record the same song, so long as they pay the
2243 original composer a fee set by the law.
2245 American law ordinarily calls this a "compulsory license," but I will refer
2246 to it as a "statutory license." A statutory license is a license whose key
2247 terms are set by law. After Congress's amendment of the Copyright Act in
2248 1909, record companies were free to distribute copies of recordings so long
2249 as they paid the composer (or copyright holder) the fee set by the statute.
2251 This is an exception within the law of copyright. When John Grisham writes a
2252 novel, a publisher is free to publish that novel only if Grisham gives the
2253 publisher permission. Grisham, in turn, is free to charge whatever he wants
2254 for that permission. The price to publish Grisham is thus set by Grisham,
2255 and copyright law ordinarily says you have no permission to use Grisham's
2256 work except with permission of Grisham.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951191"></a>
2258 But the law governing recordings gives recording artists less. And thus, in
2259 effect, the law
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>subsidizes
</em></span> the recording industry
2260 through a kind of piracy
—by giving recording artists a weaker right
2261 than it otherwise gives creative authors. The Beatles have less control over
2262 their creative work than Grisham does. And the beneficiaries of this less
2263 control are the recording industry and the public. The recording industry
2264 gets something of value for less than it otherwise would pay; the public
2265 gets access to a much wider range of musical creativity. Indeed, Congress
2266 was quite explicit about its reasons for granting this right. Its fear was
2267 the monopoly power of rights holders, and that that power would stifle
2268 follow-on creativity.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2950866" href=
"#ftn.id2950866" class=
"footnote">60</a>]
</sup> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951232"></a>
2270 While the recording industry has been quite coy about this recently,
2271 historically it has been quite a supporter of the statutory license for
2272 records. As a
1967 report from the House Committee on the Judiciary relates,
2273 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
2274 the record producers argued vigorously that the compulsory license system
2275 must be retained. They asserted that the record industry is a
2276 half-billion-dollar business of great economic importance in the United
2277 States and throughout the world; records today are the principal means of
2278 disseminating music, and this creates special problems, since performers
2279 need unhampered access to musical material on nondiscriminatory
2280 terms. Historically, the record producers pointed out, there were no
2281 recording rights before
1909 and the
1909 statute adopted the compulsory
2282 license as a deliberate anti-monopoly condition on the grant of these
2283 rights. They argue that the result has been an outpouring of recorded music,
2284 with the public being given lower prices, improved quality, and a greater
2285 choice.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951264" href=
"#ftn.id2951264" class=
"footnote">61</a>]
</sup>
2286 </p></blockquote></div><p>
2287 By limiting the rights musicians have, by partially pirating their creative
2288 work, the record producers, and the public, benefit.
2289 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Radio"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"radio"></a>Radio
</h2></div></div></div><p>
2290 Radio was also born of piracy.
2292 When a radio station plays a record on the air, that constitutes a "public
2293 performance" of the composer's work.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951300" href=
"#ftn.id2951300" class=
"footnote">62</a>]
</sup> As
2294 I described above, the law gives the composer (or copyright holder) an
2295 exclusive right to public performances of his work. The radio station thus
2296 owes the composer money for that performance.
2299 But when the radio station plays a record, it is not only performing a copy
2300 of the
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>composer's
</em></span> work. The radio station is also
2301 performing a copy of the
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>recording artist's
</em></span> work. It's
2302 one thing to have "Happy Birthday" sung on the radio by the local children's
2303 choir; it's quite another to have it sung by the Rolling Stones or Lyle
2304 Lovett. The recording artist is adding to the value of the composition
2305 performed on the radio station. And if the law were perfectly consistent,
2306 the radio station would have to pay the recording artist for his work, just
2307 as it pays the composer of the music for his work.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951366"></a>
2311 But it doesn't. Under the law governing radio performances, the radio
2312 station does not have to pay the recording artist. The radio station need
2313 only pay the composer. The radio station thus gets a bit of something for
2314 nothing. It gets to perform the recording artist's work for free, even if it
2315 must pay the composer something for the privilege of playing the song.
2316 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxmadonna"></a><p>
2317 This difference can be huge. Imagine you compose a piece of music. Imagine
2318 it is your first. You own the exclusive right to authorize public
2319 performances of that music. So if Madonna wants to sing your song in public,
2320 she has to get your permission.
2322 Imagine she does sing your song, and imagine she likes it a lot. She then
2323 decides to make a recording of your song, and it becomes a top hit. Under
2324 our law, every time a radio station plays your song, you get some money. But
2325 Madonna gets nothing, save the indirect effect on the sale of her CDs. The
2326 public performance of her recording is not a "protected" right. The radio
2327 station thus gets to
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>pirate
</em></span> the value of Madonna's work
2328 without paying her anything.
2329 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951417"></a><p>
2330 No doubt, one might argue that, on balance, the recording artists
2331 benefit. On average, the promotion they get is worth more than the
2332 performance rights they give up. Maybe. But even if so, the law ordinarily
2333 gives the creator the right to make this choice. By making the choice for
2334 him or her, the law gives the radio station the right to take something for
2336 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Kabel-TV"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"cabletv"></a>Kabel-TV
</h2></div></div></div><p>
2338 Cable TV was also born of a kind of piracy.
2341 When cable entrepreneurs first started wiring communities with cable
2342 television in
1948, most refused to pay broadcasters for the content that
2343 they echoed to their customers. Even when the cable companies started
2344 selling access to television broadcasts, they refused to pay for what they
2345 sold. Cable companies were thus Napsterizing broadcasters' content, but more
2346 egregiously than anything Napster ever did
— Napster never charged for
2347 the content it enabled others to give away.
2348 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951451"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951468"></a><p>
2349 Broadcasters and copyright owners were quick to attack this theft. Rosel
2350 Hyde, chairman of the FCC, viewed the practice as a kind of "unfair and
2351 potentially destructive competition."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951479" href=
"#ftn.id2951479" class=
"footnote">63</a>]
</sup>
2352 There may have been a "public interest" in spreading the reach of cable TV,
2353 but as Douglas Anello, general counsel to the National Association of
2354 Broadcasters, asked Senator Quentin Burdick during testimony, "Does public
2355 interest dictate that you use somebody else's property?"
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951495" href=
"#ftn.id2951495" class=
"footnote">64</a>]
</sup> As another broadcaster put it,
2356 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
2357 The extraordinary thing about the CATV business is that it is the only
2358 business I know of where the product that is being sold is not paid
2359 for.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951512" href=
"#ftn.id2951512" class=
"footnote">65</a>]
</sup>
2360 </p></blockquote></div><p>
2361 Again, the demand of the copyright holders seemed reasonable enough:
2362 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
2363 All we are asking for is a very simple thing, that people who now take our
2364 property for nothing pay for it. We are trying to stop piracy and I don't
2365 think there is any lesser word to describe it. I think there are harsher
2366 words which would fit it.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951536" href=
"#ftn.id2951536" class=
"footnote">66</a>]
</sup>
2367 </p></blockquote></div><p>
2368 Disse var "gratispassasjerer", sa presidenten Charlton Heston i Screen
2369 Actor's Guild, som "tok lønna fra skuespillerne"
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951554" href=
"#ftn.id2951554" class=
"footnote">67</a>]
</sup>
2371 Men igjen, det er en annen side i debatten. Som assisterende justisminister
2372 Edwin Zimmerman sa det,
2373 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
2374 Our point here is that unlike the problem of whether you have any copyright
2375 protection at all, the problem here is whether copyright holders who are
2376 already compensated, who already have a monopoly, should be permitted to
2377 extend that monopoly. . . . The question here is how much compensation they
2378 should have and how far back they should carry their right to
2379 compensation.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951581" href=
"#ftn.id2951581" class=
"footnote">68</a>]
</sup> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951599"></a>
2380 </p></blockquote></div><p>
2381 Opphavsrettinnehaverne tok kabelselskapene til retten. Høyesterett fant to
2382 ganger at kabelselskaper ikke skyldte opphavsrettinnehaverne noen ting.
2384 It took Congress almost thirty years before it resolved the question of
2385 whether cable companies had to pay for the content they "pirated." In the
2386 end, Congress resolved this question in the same way that it resolved the
2387 question about record players and player pianos. Yes, cable companies would
2388 have to pay for the content that they broadcast; but the price they would
2389 have to pay was not set by the copyright owner. The price was set by law,
2390 so that the broadcasters couldn't exercise veto power over the emerging
2391 technologies of cable. Cable companies thus built their empire in part upon
2392 a "piracy" of the value created by broadcasters' content.
2394 These separate stories sing a common theme. If "piracy" means using value
2395 from someone else's creative property without permission from that
2396 creator
—as it is increasingly described today
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951586" href=
"#ftn.id2951586" class=
"footnote">69</a>]
</sup> — then
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>every
</em></span> industry
2397 affected by copyright today is the product and beneficiary of a certain kind
2398 of piracy. Film, records, radio, cable TV. . . . The list is long and could
2399 well be expanded. Every generation welcomes the pirates from the last. Every
2400 generation
—until now.
2401 </p></div><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950842" href=
"#id2950842" class=
"para">51</a>]
</sup>
2403 I am grateful to Peter DiMauro for pointing me to this extraordinary
2404 history. See also Siva Vaidhyanathan,
<em class=
"citetitle">Copyrights and
2405 Copywrongs
</em>,
87–93, which details Edison's "adventures"
2406 with copyright and patent.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2950756"></a>
2407 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950900" href=
"#id2950900" class=
"para">52</a>]
</sup>
2410 J. A. Aberdeen,
<em class=
"citetitle">Hollywood Renegades: The Society of Independent
2411 Motion Picture Producers
</em> (Cobblestone Entertainment,
2000) and
2412 expanded texts posted at "The Edison Movie Monopoly: The Motion Picture
2413 Patents Company vs. the Independent Outlaws," available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
11</a>. For a discussion of
2414 the economic motive behind both these limits and the limits imposed by
2415 Victor on phonographs, see Randal C. Picker, "From Edison to the Broadcast
2416 Flag: Mechanisms of Consent and Refusal and the Propertization of Copyright"
2417 (September
2002), University of Chicago Law School, James M. Olin Program in
2418 Law and Economics, Working Paper No.
159.
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950954" href=
"#id2950954" class=
"para">53</a>]
</sup>
2421 Marc Wanamaker, "The First Studios,"
<em class=
"citetitle">The Silents
2422 Majority
</em>, archived at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
12</a>.
2423 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951063" href=
"#id2951063" class=
"para">54</a>]
</sup>
2426 To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright: Hearings on S.
6330
2427 and H.R.
19853 Before the ( Joint) Committees on Patents,
59th Cong.
59,
1st
2428 sess. (
1906) (statement of Senator Alfred B. Kittredge, of South Dakota,
2429 chairman), reprinted in
<em class=
"citetitle">Legislative History of the Copyright
2430 Act
</em>, E. Fulton Brylawski and Abe Goldman, eds. (South
2431 Hackensack, N.J.: Rothman Reprints,
1976).
2432 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951086" href=
"#id2951086" class=
"para">55</a>]
</sup>
2435 To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright,
223 (statement of
2436 Nathan Burkan, attorney for the Music Publishers Association).
2437 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951096" href=
"#id2951096" class=
"para">56</a>]
</sup>
2440 To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright,
226 (statement of
2441 Nathan Burkan, attorney for the Music Publishers Association).
2442 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951108" href=
"#id2951108" class=
"para">57</a>]
</sup>
2445 To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright,
23 (statement of
2446 John Philip Sousa, composer).
2447 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951125" href=
"#id2951125" class=
"para">58</a>]
</sup>
2451 To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright,
283–84
2452 (statement of Albert Walker, representative of the Auto-Music Perforating
2453 Company of New York).
2454 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951131" href=
"#id2951131" class=
"para">59</a>]
</sup>
2457 To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright,
376 (prepared
2458 memorandum of Philip Mauro, general patent counsel of the American
2459 Graphophone Company Association).
2460 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2950866" href=
"#id2950866" class=
"para">60</a>]
</sup>
2464 Copyright Law Revision: Hearings on S.
2499, S.
2900, H.R.
243, and
2465 H.R.
11794 Before the ( Joint) Committee on Patents,
60th Cong.,
1st sess.,
2466 217 (
1908) (statement of Senator Reed Smoot, chairman), reprinted in
2467 <em class=
"citetitle">Legislative History of the
1909 Copyright Act
</em>,
2468 E. Fulton Brylawski and Abe Goldman, eds. (South Hackensack, N.J.: Rothman
2470 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951264" href=
"#id2951264" class=
"para">61</a>]
</sup>
2473 Copyright Law Revision: Report to Accompany H.R.
2512, House Committee on
2474 the Judiciary,
90th Cong.,
1st sess., House Document no.
83, (
8 March
2475 1967). I am grateful to Glenn Brown for drawing my attention to this report.
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951300" href=
"#id2951300" class=
"para">62</a>]
</sup>
2477 See
17 <em class=
"citetitle">United States Code
</em>, sections
106 and
110. At
2478 the beginning, record companies printed "Not Licensed for Radio Broadcast"
2479 and other messages purporting to restrict the ability to play a record on a
2480 radio station. Judge Learned Hand rejected the argument that a warning
2481 attached to a record might restrict the rights of the radio station. See
2482 <em class=
"citetitle">RCA Manufacturing
2483 Co
</em>. v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Whiteman
</em>,
114 F.
2d
86 (
2nd
2484 Cir.
1940). See also Randal C. Picker, "From Edison to the Broadcast Flag:
2485 Mechanisms of Consent and Refusal and the Propertization of Copyright,"
2486 <em class=
"citetitle">University of Chicago Law Review
</em> 70 (
2003):
281.
2487 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951325"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951333"></a>
2488 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951479" href=
"#id2951479" class=
"para">63</a>]
</sup>
2491 Copyright Law Revision
—CATV: Hearing on S.
1006 Before the
2492 Subcommittee on Patents, Trademarks, and Copyrights of the Senate Committee
2493 on the Judiciary,
89th Cong.,
2nd sess.,
78 (
1966) (statement of Rosel
2494 H. Hyde, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission).
2495 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951495" href=
"#id2951495" class=
"para">64</a>]
</sup>
2498 Copyright Law Revision
—CATV,
116 (statement of Douglas A. Anello,
2499 general counsel of the National Association of Broadcasters).
2500 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951512" href=
"#id2951512" class=
"para">65</a>]
</sup>
2503 Copyright Law Revision
—CATV,
126 (statement of Ernest W. Jennes,
2504 general counsel of the Association of Maximum Service Telecasters, Inc.).
2505 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951536" href=
"#id2951536" class=
"para">66</a>]
</sup>
2508 Copyright Law Revision
—CATV,
169 (joint statement of Arthur B. Krim,
2509 president of United Artists Corp., and John Sinn, president of United
2510 Artists Television, Inc.).
2511 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951554" href=
"#id2951554" class=
"para">67</a>]
</sup>
2514 Copyright Law Revision
—CATV,
209 (vitnemål fra Charlton Heston,
2515 president i Screen Actors Guild).
2516 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951581" href=
"#id2951581" class=
"para">68</a>]
</sup>
2518 Copyright Law Revision
—CATV,
216 (statement of Edwin M. Zimmerman,
2519 acting assistant attorney general).
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951559"></a>
2520 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951586" href=
"#id2951586" class=
"para">69</a>]
</sup>
2523 See, for example, National Music Publisher's Association,
<em class=
"citetitle">The
2524 Engine of Free Expression: Copyright on the Internet
—The Myth of Free
2525 Information
</em>, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
13</a>. "The threat of
2526 piracy
—the use of someone else's creative work without permission or
2527 compensation
—has grown with the Internet."
2528 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title='Kapittel
6. Kapittel fem:
"Piratvirksomhet"'
><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"piracy"></a>Kapittel
6. Kapittel fem: "Piratvirksomhet"
</h2></div></div></div><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#piracy-i">Piracy I
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#piracy-ii">Piracy II
</a></span></dt></dl></div><p>
2529 There is piracy of copyrighted material. Lots of it. This piracy comes in
2530 many forms. The most significant is commercial piracy, the unauthorized
2531 taking of other people's content within a commercial context. Despite the
2532 many justifications that are offered in its defense, this taking is
2533 wrong. No one should condone it, and the law should stop it.
2536 But as well as copy-shop piracy, there is another kind of "taking" that is
2537 more directly related to the Internet. That taking, too, seems wrong to
2538 many, and it is wrong much of the time. Before we paint this taking
2539 "piracy," however, we should understand its nature a bit more. For the harm
2540 of this taking is significantly more ambiguous than outright copying, and
2541 the law should account for that ambiguity, as it has so often done in the
2544 </p><div class=
"section" title=
"Piracy I"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"piracy-i"></a>Piracy I
</h2></div></div></div><p>
2545 All across the world, but especially in Asia and Eastern Europe, there are
2546 businesses that do nothing but take others people's copyrighted content,
2547 copy it, and sell it
—all without the permission of a copyright
2548 owner. The recording industry estimates that it loses about $
4.6 billion
2549 every year to physical piracy
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951663" href=
"#ftn.id2951663" class=
"footnote">70</a>]
</sup> (that
2550 works out to one in three CDs sold worldwide). The MPAA estimates that it
2551 loses $
3 billion annually worldwide to piracy.
2553 This is piracy plain and simple. Nothing in the argument of this book, nor
2554 in the argument that most people make when talking about the subject of this
2555 book, should draw into doubt this simple point: This piracy is wrong.
2557 Which is not to say that excuses and justifications couldn't be made for
2558 it. We could, for example, remind ourselves that for the first one hundred
2559 years of the American Republic, America did not honor foreign copyrights. We
2560 were born, in this sense, a pirate nation. It might therefore seem
2561 hypocritical for us to insist so strongly that other developing nations
2562 treat as wrong what we, for the first hundred years of our existence,
2565 That excuse isn't terribly strong. Technically, our law did not ban the
2566 taking of foreign works. It explicitly limited itself to American
2567 works. Thus the American publishers who published foreign works without the
2568 permission of foreign authors were not violating any rule. The copy shops
2569 in Asia, by contrast, are violating Asian law. Asian law does protect
2570 foreign copyrights, and the actions of the copy shops violate that law. So
2571 the wrong of piracy that they engage in is not just a moral wrong, but a
2572 legal wrong, and not just an internationally legal wrong, but a locally
2573 legal wrong as well.
2576 True, these local rules have, in effect, been imposed upon these
2577 countries. No country can be part of the world economy and choose not to
2578 protect copyright internationally. We may have been born a pirate nation,
2579 but we will not allow any other nation to have a similar childhood.
2581 If a country is to be treated as a sovereign, however, then its laws are its
2582 laws regardless of their source. The international law under which these
2583 nations live gives them some opportunities to escape the burden of
2584 intellectual property law.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951788" href=
"#ftn.id2951788" class=
"footnote">71</a>]
</sup> In my view,
2585 more developing nations should take advantage of that opportunity, but when
2586 they don't, then their laws should be respected. And under the laws of these
2587 nations, this piracy is wrong.
2589 Alternatively, we could try to excuse this piracy by noting that in any
2590 case, it does no harm to the industry. The Chinese who get access to
2591 American CDs at
50 cents a copy are not people who would have bought those
2592 American CDs at $
15 a copy. So no one really has any less money than they
2593 otherwise would have had.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2951833" href=
"#ftn.id2951833" class=
"footnote">72</a>]
</sup>
2595 This is often true (though I have friends who have purchased many thousands
2596 of pirated DVDs who certainly have enough money to pay for the content they
2597 have taken), and it does mitigate to some degree the harm caused by such
2598 taking. Extremists in this debate love to say, "You wouldn't go into Barnes
2599 & Noble and take a book off of the shelf without paying; why should it
2600 be any different with on-line music?" The difference is, of course, that
2601 when you take a book from Barnes
& Noble, it has one less book to
2602 sell. By contrast, when you take an MP3 from a computer network, there is
2603 not one less CD that can be sold. The physics of piracy of the intangible
2604 are different from the physics of piracy of the tangible.
2607 This argument is still very weak. However, although copyright is a property
2608 right of a very special sort, it
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>is
</em></span> a property
2609 right. Like all property rights, the copyright gives the owner the right to
2610 decide the terms under which content is shared. If the copyright owner
2611 doesn't want to sell, she doesn't have to. There are exceptions: important
2612 statutory licenses that apply to copyrighted content regardless of the wish
2613 of the copyright owner. Those licenses give people the right to "take"
2614 copyrighted content whether or not the copyright owner wants to sell. But
2615 where the law does not give people the right to take content, it is wrong to
2616 take that content even if the wrong does no harm. If we have a property
2617 system, and that system is properly balanced to the technology of a time,
2618 then it is wrong to take property without the permission of a property
2619 owner. That is exactly what "property" means.
2621 Finally, we could try to excuse this piracy with the argument that the
2622 piracy actually helps the copyright owner. When the Chinese "steal" Windows,
2623 that makes the Chinese dependent on Microsoft. Microsoft loses the value of
2624 the software that was taken. But it gains users who are used to life in the
2625 Microsoft world. Over time, as the nation grows more wealthy, more and more
2626 people will buy software rather than steal it. And hence over time, because
2627 that buying will benefit Microsoft, Microsoft benefits from the piracy. If
2628 instead of pirating Microsoft Windows, the Chinese used the free GNU/Linux
2629 operating system, then these Chinese users would not eventually be buying
2630 Microsoft. Without piracy, then, Microsoft would lose.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951929"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951935"></a>
2631 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951946"></a>
2633 This argument, too, is somewhat true. The addiction strategy is a good
2634 one. Many businesses practice it. Some thrive because of it. Law students,
2635 for example, are given free access to the two largest legal databases. The
2636 companies marketing both hope the students will become so used to their
2637 service that they will want to use it and not the other when they become
2638 lawyers (and must pay high subscription fees).
2640 Still, the argument is not terribly persuasive. We don't give the alcoholic
2641 a defense when he steals his first beer, merely because that will make it
2642 more likely that he will buy the next three. Instead, we ordinarily allow
2643 businesses to decide for themselves when it is best to give their product
2644 away. If Microsoft fears the competition of GNU/Linux, then Microsoft can
2645 give its product away, as it did, for example, with Internet Explorer to
2646 fight Netscape. A property right means giving the property owner the right
2647 to say who gets access to what
—at least ordinarily. And if the law
2648 properly balances the rights of the copyright owner with the rights of
2649 access, then violating the law is still wrong.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951711"></a>
2653 Thus, while I understand the pull of these justifications for piracy, and I
2654 certainly see the motivation, in my view, in the end, these efforts at
2655 justifying commercial piracy simply don't cut it. This kind of piracy is
2656 rampant and just plain wrong. It doesn't transform the content it steals; it
2657 doesn't transform the market it competes in. It merely gives someone access
2658 to something that the law says he should not have. Nothing has changed to
2659 draw that law into doubt. This form of piracy is flat out wrong.
2661 But as the examples from the four chapters that introduced this part
2662 suggest, even if some piracy is plainly wrong, not all "piracy" is. Or at
2663 least, not all "piracy" is wrong if that term is understood in the way it is
2664 increasingly used today. Many kinds of "piracy" are useful and productive,
2665 to produce either new content or new ways of doing business. Neither our
2666 tradition nor any tradition has ever banned all "piracy" in that sense of
2669 This doesn't mean that there are no questions raised by the latest piracy
2670 concern, peer-to-peer file sharing. But it does mean that we need to
2671 understand the harm in peer-to-peer sharing a bit more before we condemn it
2672 to the gallows with the charge of piracy.
2674 For (
1) like the original Hollywood, p2p sharing escapes an overly
2675 controlling industry; and (
2) like the original recording industry, it
2676 simply exploits a new way to distribute content; but (
3) unlike cable TV, no
2677 one is selling the content that is shared on p2p services.
2679 These differences distinguish p2p sharing from true piracy. They should push
2680 us to find a way to protect artists while enabling this sharing to survive.
2681 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Piracy II"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"piracy-ii"></a>Piracy II
</h2></div></div></div><p>
2683 The key to the "piracy" that the law aims to quash is a use that "rob[s] the
2684 author of [his] profit."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952046" href=
"#ftn.id2952046" class=
"footnote">73</a>]
</sup> This means we
2685 must determine whether and how much p2p sharing harms before we know how
2686 strongly the law should seek to either prevent it or find an alternative to
2687 assure the author of his profit.
2689 Peer-to-peer sharing was made famous by Napster. But the inventors of the
2690 Napster technology had not made any major technological innovations. Like
2691 every great advance in innovation on the Internet (and, arguably, off the
2692 Internet as well
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952070" href=
"#ftn.id2952070" class=
"footnote">74</a>]
</sup>), Shawn Fanning and
2693 crew had simply put together components that had been developed
2694 independently.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2952099"></a>
2696 The result was spontaneous combustion. Launched in July
1999, Napster
2697 amassed over
10 million users within nine months. After eighteen months,
2698 there were close to
80 million registered users of the system.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952112" href=
"#ftn.id2952112" class=
"footnote">75</a>]
</sup> Courts quickly shut Napster down, but other
2699 services emerged to take its place. (Kazaa is currently the most popular p2p
2700 service. It boasts over
100 million members.) These services' systems are
2701 different architecturally, though not very different in function: Each
2702 enables users to make content available to any number of other users. With a
2703 p2p system, you can share your favorite songs with your best friend
—
2704 or your
20,
000 best friends.
2706 According to a number of estimates, a huge proportion of Americans have
2707 tasted file-sharing technology. A study by Ipsos-Insight in September
2002
2708 estimated that
60 million Americans had downloaded music
—28 percent of
2709 Americans older than
12.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952148" href=
"#ftn.id2952148" class=
"footnote">76</a>]
</sup> A survey by
2710 the NPD group quoted in
<em class=
"citetitle">The New York Times
</em> estimated
2711 that
43 million citizens used file-sharing networks to exchange content in
2712 May
2003.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952176" href=
"#ftn.id2952176" class=
"footnote">77</a>]
</sup> The vast majority of these
2713 are not kids. Whatever the actual figure, a massive quantity of content is
2714 being "taken" on these networks. The ease and inexpensiveness of
2715 file-sharing networks have inspired millions to enjoy music in a way that
2718 Some of this enjoying involves copyright infringement. Some of it does
2719 not. And even among the part that is technically copyright infringement,
2720 calculating the actual harm to copyright owners is more complicated than one
2721 might think. So consider
—a bit more carefully than the polarized
2722 voices around this debate usually do
—the kinds of sharing that file
2723 sharing enables, and the kinds of harm it entails.
2727 Fildelerne deler ulike typer innhold. Vi kan derel disse ulike typene inn i
2729 </p><div class=
"orderedlist"><ol class=
"orderedlist" type=
"A"><li class=
"listitem"><p>
2731 There are some who use sharing networks as substitutes for purchasing
2732 content. Thus, when a new Madonna CD is released, rather than buying the CD,
2733 these users simply take it. We might quibble about whether everyone who
2734 takes it would actually have bought it if sharing didn't make it available
2735 for free. Most probably wouldn't have, but clearly there are some who
2736 would. The latter are the target of category A: users who download instead
2737 of purchasing.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2952230"></a>
2738 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
2741 There are some who use sharing networks to sample music before purchasing
2742 it. Thus, a friend sends another friend an MP3 of an artist he's not heard
2743 of. The other friend then buys CDs by that artist. This is a kind of
2744 targeted advertising, quite likely to succeed. If the friend recommending
2745 the album gains nothing from a bad recommendation, then one could expect
2746 that the recommendations will actually be quite good. The net effect of this
2747 sharing could increase the quantity of music purchased.
2748 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
2751 There are many who use sharing networks to get access to copyrighted content
2752 that is no longer sold or that they would not have purchased because the
2753 transaction costs off the Net are too high. This use of sharing networks is
2754 among the most rewarding for many. Songs that were part of your childhood
2755 but have long vanished from the marketplace magically appear again on the
2756 network. (One friend told me that when she discovered Napster, she spent a
2757 solid weekend "recalling" old songs. She was astonished at the range and mix
2758 of content that was available.) For content not sold, this is still
2759 technically a violation of copyright, though because the copyright owner is
2760 not selling the content anymore, the economic harm is zero
—the same
2761 harm that occurs when I sell my collection of
1960s
45-rpm records to a
2763 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
2768 Finally, there are many who use sharing networks to get access to content
2769 that is not copyrighted or that the copyright owner wants to give away.
2770 </p></li></ol></div><p>
2771 Hvordan balanserer disse ulike delingstypene?
2773 Let's start with some simple but important points. From the perspective of
2774 the law, only type D sharing is clearly legal. From the perspective of
2775 economics, only type A sharing is clearly harmful.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952298" href=
"#ftn.id2952298" class=
"footnote">78</a>]
</sup> Type B sharing is illegal but plainly
2776 beneficial. Type C sharing is illegal, yet good for society (since more
2777 exposure to music is good) and harmless to the artist (since the work is
2778 not otherwise available). So how sharing matters on balance is a hard
2779 question to answer
—and certainly much more difficult than the current
2780 rhetoric around the issue suggests.
2782 Whether on balance sharing is harmful depends importantly on how harmful
2783 type A sharing is. Just as Edison complained about Hollywood, composers
2784 complained about piano rolls, recording artists complained about radio, and
2785 broadcasters complained about cable TV, the music industry complains that
2786 type A sharing is a kind of "theft" that is "devastating" the industry.
2788 While the numbers do suggest that sharing is harmful, how harmful is harder
2789 to reckon. It has long been the recording industry's practice to blame
2790 technology for any drop in sales. The history of cassette recording is a
2791 good example. As a study by Cap Gemini Ernst
& Young put it, "Rather
2792 than exploiting this new, popular technology, the labels fought
2793 it."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952342" href=
"#ftn.id2952342" class=
"footnote">79</a>]
</sup> The labels claimed that every
2794 album taped was an album unsold, and when record sales fell by
11.4 percent
2795 in
1981, the industry claimed that its point was proved. Technology was the
2796 problem, and banning or regulating technology was the answer.
2798 Yet soon thereafter, and before Congress was given an opportunity to enact
2799 regulation, MTV was launched, and the industry had a record turnaround. "In
2800 the end," Cap Gemini concludes, "the `crisis' . . . was not the fault of the
2801 tapers
—who did not [stop after MTV came into being]
—but had to a
2802 large extent resulted from stagnation in musical innovation at the major
2803 labels."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952380" href=
"#ftn.id2952380" class=
"footnote">80</a>]
</sup>
2805 But just because the industry was wrong before does not mean it is wrong
2806 today. To evaluate the real threat that p2p sharing presents to the industry
2807 in particular, and society in general
—or at least the society that
2808 inherits the tradition that gave us the film industry, the record industry,
2809 the radio industry, cable TV, and the VCR
—the question is not simply
2810 whether type A sharing is harmful. The question is also
2811 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>how
</em></span> harmful type A sharing is, and how beneficial the
2812 other types of sharing are.
2814 We start to answer this question by focusing on the net harm, from the
2815 standpoint of the industry as a whole, that sharing networks cause. The
2816 "net harm" to the industry as a whole is the amount by which type A sharing
2817 exceeds type B. If the record companies sold more records through sampling
2818 than they lost through substitution, then sharing networks would actually
2819 benefit music companies on balance. They would therefore have little
2820 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>static
</em></span> reason to resist them.
2823 Could that be true? Could the industry as a whole be gaining because of file
2824 sharing? Odd as that might sound, the data about CD sales actually suggest
2827 In
2002, the RIAA reported that CD sales had fallen by
8.9 percent, from
882
2828 million to
803 million units; revenues fell
6.7 percent.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952436" href=
"#ftn.id2952436" class=
"footnote">81</a>]
</sup> This confirms a trend over the past few years. The
2829 RIAA blames Internet piracy for the trend, though there are many other
2830 causes that could account for this drop. SoundScan, for example, reports a
2831 more than
20 percent drop in the number of CDs released since
1999. That no
2832 doubt accounts for some of the decrease in sales. Rising prices could
2833 account for at least some of the loss. "From
1999 to
2001, the average price
2834 of a CD rose
7.2 percent, from $
13.04 to $
14.19."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952489" href=
"#ftn.id2952489" class=
"footnote">82</a>]
</sup> Competition from other forms of media could also
2835 account for some of the decline. As Jane Black of
2836 <em class=
"citetitle">BusinessWeek
</em> notes, "The soundtrack to the film
2837 <em class=
"citetitle">High Fidelity
</em> has a list price of $
18.98. You could
2838 get the whole movie [on DVD] for $
19.99."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952522" href=
"#ftn.id2952522" class=
"footnote">83</a>]
</sup>
2843 But let's assume the RIAA is right, and all of the decline in CD sales is
2844 because of Internet sharing. Here's the rub: In the same period that the
2845 RIAA estimates that
803 million CDs were sold, the RIAA estimates that
2.1
2846 billion CDs were downloaded for free. Thus, although
2.6 times the total
2847 number of CDs sold were downloaded for free, sales revenue fell by just
6.7
2850 There are too many different things happening at the same time to explain
2851 these numbers definitively, but one conclusion is unavoidable: The recording
2852 industry constantly asks, "What's the difference between downloading a song
2853 and stealing a CD?"
—but their own numbers reveal the difference. If I
2854 steal a CD, then there is one less CD to sell. Every taking is a lost
2855 sale. But on the basis of the numbers the RIAA provides, it is absolutely
2856 clear that the same is not true of downloads. If every download were a lost
2857 sale
—if every use of Kazaa "rob[bed] the author of [his]
2858 profit"
—then the industry would have suffered a
100 percent drop in
2859 sales last year, not a
7 percent drop. If
2.6 times the number of CDs sold
2860 were downloaded for free, and yet sales revenue dropped by just
6.7 percent,
2861 then there is a huge difference between "downloading a song and stealing a
2864 These are the harms
—alleged and perhaps exaggerated but, let's assume,
2865 real. What of the benefits? File sharing may impose costs on the recording
2866 industry. What value does it produce in addition to these costs?
2868 One benefit is type C sharing
—making available content that is
2869 technically still under copyright but is no longer commercially available.
2870 This is not a small category of content. There are millions of tracks that
2871 are no longer commercially available.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952546" href=
"#ftn.id2952546" class=
"footnote">84</a>]
</sup>
2872 And while it's conceivable that some of this content is not available
2873 because the artist producing the content doesn't want it to be made
2874 available, the vast majority of it is unavailable solely because the
2875 publisher or the distributor has decided it no longer makes economic sense
2876 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>to the company
</em></span> to make it available.
2878 In real space
—long before the Internet
—the market had a simple
2879 response to this problem: used book and record stores. There are thousands
2880 of used book and used record stores in America today.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952602" href=
"#ftn.id2952602" class=
"footnote">85</a>]
</sup> These stores buy content from owners, then sell the
2881 content they buy. And under American copyright law, when they buy and sell
2882 this content,
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>even if the content is still under
2883 copyright
</em></span>, the copyright owner doesn't get a dime. Used book and
2884 record stores are commercial entities; their owners make money from the
2885 content they sell; but as with cable companies before statutory licensing,
2886 they don't have to pay the copyright owner for the content they sell.
2887 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2952649"></a><p>
2888 Type C sharing, then, is very much like used book stores or used record
2889 stores. It is different, of course, because the person making the content
2890 available isn't making money from making the content available. It is also
2891 different, of course, because in real space, when I sell a record, I don't
2892 have it anymore, while in cyberspace, when someone shares my
1949 recording
2893 of Bernstein's "Two Love Songs," I still have it. That difference would
2894 matter economically if the owner of the copyright were selling the record in
2895 competition to my sharing. But we're talking about the class of content that
2896 is not currently commercially available. The Internet is making it
2897 available, through cooperative sharing, without competing with the market.
2899 It may well be, all things considered, that it would be better if the
2900 copyright owner got something from this trade. But just because it may well
2901 be better, it doesn't follow that it would be good to ban used book
2902 stores. Or put differently, if you think that type C sharing should be
2903 stopped, do you think that libraries and used book stores should be shut as
2907 Finally, and perhaps most importantly, file-sharing networks enable type D
2908 sharing to occur
—the sharing of content that copyright owners want to
2909 have shared or for which there is no continuing copyright. This sharing
2910 clearly benefits authors and society. Science fiction author Cory Doctorow,
2911 for example, released his first novel,
<em class=
"citetitle">Down and Out in the Magic
2912 Kingdom
</em>, both free on-line and in bookstores on the same
2913 day. His (and his publisher's) thinking was that the on-line distribution
2914 would be a great advertisement for the "real" book. People would read part
2915 on-line, and then decide whether they liked the book or not. If they liked
2916 it, they would be more likely to buy it. Doctorow's content is type D
2917 content. If sharing networks enable his work to be spread, then both he and
2918 society are better off. (Actually, much better off: It is a great book!)
2920 Likewise for work in the public domain: This sharing benefits society with
2921 no legal harm to authors at all. If efforts to solve the problem of type A
2922 sharing destroy the opportunity for type D sharing, then we lose something
2923 important in order to protect type A content.
2925 The point throughout is this: While the recording industry understandably
2926 says, "This is how much we've lost," we must also ask, "How much has society
2927 gained from p2p sharing? What are the efficiencies? What is the content that
2928 otherwise would be unavailable?"
2930 For unlike the piracy I described in the first section of this chapter, much
2931 of the "piracy" that file sharing enables is plainly legal and good. And
2932 like the piracy I described in chapter
4, much of this piracy is motivated
2933 by a new way of spreading content caused by changes in the technology of
2934 distribution. Thus, consistent with the tradition that gave us Hollywood,
2935 radio, the recording industry, and cable TV, the question we should be
2936 asking about file sharing is how best to preserve its benefits while
2937 minimizing (to the extent possible) the wrongful harm it causes artists. The
2938 question is one of balance. The law should seek that balance, and that
2939 balance will be found only with time.
2941 Men er ikke krigen bare en krig mot ulovlig deling? Er ikke angrepsmålet
2942 bare det du kaller type A-deling?
2944 You would think. And we should hope. But so far, it is not. The effect of
2945 the war purportedly on type A sharing alone has been felt far beyond that
2946 one class of sharing. That much is obvious from the Napster case
2947 itself. When Napster told the district court that it had developed a
2948 technology to block the transfer of
99.4 percent of identified infringing
2949 material, the district court told counsel for Napster
99.4 percent was not
2950 good enough. Napster had to push the infringements "down to
2951 zero."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952752" href=
"#ftn.id2952752" class=
"footnote">86</a>]
</sup>
2953 If
99.4 percent is not good enough, then this is a war on file-sharing
2954 technologies, not a war on copyright infringement. There is no way to assure
2955 that a p2p system is used
100 percent of the time in compliance with the
2956 law, any more than there is a way to assure that
100 percent of VCRs or
100
2957 percent of Xerox machines or
100 percent of handguns are used in compliance
2958 with the law. Zero tolerance means zero p2p. The court's ruling means that
2959 we as a society must lose the benefits of p2p, even for the totally legal
2960 and beneficial uses they serve, simply to assure that there are zero
2961 copyright infringements caused by p2p.
2963 Zero tolerance has not been our history. It has not produced the content
2964 industry that we know today. The history of American law has been a process
2965 of balance. As new technologies changed the way content was distributed, the
2966 law adjusted, after some time, to the new technology. In this adjustment,
2967 the law sought to ensure the legitimate rights of creators while protecting
2968 innovation. Sometimes this has meant more rights for creators. Sometimes
2971 So, as we've seen, when "mechanical reproduction" threatened the interests
2972 of composers, Congress balanced the rights of composers against the
2973 interests of the recording industry. It granted rights to composers, but
2974 also to the recording artists: Composers were to be paid, but at a price set
2975 by Congress. But when radio started broadcasting the recordings made by
2976 these recording artists, and they complained to Congress that their
2977 "creative property" was not being respected (since the radio station did not
2978 have to pay them for the creativity it broadcast), Congress rejected their
2979 claim. An indirect benefit was enough.
2981 Cable TV followed the pattern of record albums. When the courts rejected the
2982 claim that cable broadcasters had to pay for the content they rebroadcast,
2983 Congress responded by giving broadcasters a right to compensation, but at a
2984 level set by the law. It likewise gave cable companies the right to the
2985 content, so long as they paid the statutory price.
2990 This compromise, like the compromise affecting records and player pianos,
2991 served two important goals
—indeed, the two central goals of any
2992 copyright legislation. First, the law assured that new innovators would have
2993 the freedom to develop new ways to deliver content. Second, the law assured
2994 that copyright holders would be paid for the content that was
2995 distributed. One fear was that if Congress simply required cable TV to pay
2996 copyright holders whatever they demanded for their content, then copyright
2997 holders associated with broadcasters would use their power to stifle this
2998 new technology, cable. But if Congress had permitted cable to use
2999 broadcasters' content for free, then it would have unfairly subsidized
3000 cable. Thus Congress chose a path that would assure
3001 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>compensation
</em></span> without giving the past (broadcasters)
3002 control over the future (cable).
3003 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2952849"></a><p>
3004 In the same year that Congress struck this balance, two major producers and
3005 distributors of film content filed a lawsuit against another technology, the
3006 video tape recorder (VTR, or as we refer to them today, VCRs) that Sony had
3007 produced, the Betamax. Disney's and Universal's claim against Sony was
3008 relatively simple: Sony produced a device, Disney and Universal claimed,
3009 that enabled consumers to engage in copyright infringement. Because the
3010 device that Sony built had a "record" button, the device could be used to
3011 record copyrighted movies and shows. Sony was therefore benefiting from the
3012 copyright infringement of its customers. It should therefore, Disney and
3013 Universal claimed, be partially liable for that infringement.
3016 There was something to Disney's and Universal's claim. Sony did decide to
3017 design its machine to make it very simple to record television shows. It
3018 could have built the machine to block or inhibit any direct copying from a
3019 television broadcast. Or possibly, it could have built the machine to copy
3020 only if there were a special "copy me" signal on the line. It was clear that
3021 there were many television shows that did not grant anyone permission to
3022 copy. Indeed, if anyone had asked, no doubt the majority of shows would not
3023 have authorized copying. And in the face of this obvious preference, Sony
3024 could have designed its system to minimize the opportunity for copyright
3025 infringement. It did not, and for that, Disney and Universal wanted to hold
3026 it responsible for the architecture it chose.
3028 MPAA president Jack Valenti became the studios' most vocal champion. Valenti
3029 called VCRs "tapeworms." He warned, "When there are
20,
30,
40 million of
3030 these VCRs in the land, we will be invaded by millions of `tapeworms,'
3031 eating away at the very heart and essence of the most precious asset the
3032 copyright owner has, his copyright."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952898" href=
"#ftn.id2952898" class=
"footnote">87</a>]
</sup>
3033 "One does not have to be trained in sophisticated marketing and creative
3034 judgment," he told Congress, "to understand the devastation on the
3035 after-theater marketplace caused by the hundreds of millions of tapings that
3036 will adversely impact on the future of the creative community in this
3037 country. It is simply a question of basic economics and plain common
3038 sense."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952915" href=
"#ftn.id2952915" class=
"footnote">88</a>]
</sup> Indeed, as surveys would later
3039 show, percent of VCR owners had movie libraries of ten videos or
3040 more
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952924" href=
"#ftn.id2952924" class=
"footnote">89</a>]
</sup> — a use the Court would
3041 later hold was not "fair." By "allowing VCR owners to copy freely by the
3042 means of an exemption from copyright infringementwithout creating a
3043 mechanism to compensate copyrightowners," Valenti testified, Congress would
3044 "take from the owners the very essence of their property: the exclusive
3045 right to control who may use their work, that is, who may copy it and
3046 thereby profit from its reproduction."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952832" href=
"#ftn.id2952832" class=
"footnote">90</a>]
</sup>
3048 It took eight years for this case to be resolved by the Supreme Court. In
3049 the interim, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which includes Hollywood in
3050 its jurisdiction
—leading Judge Alex Kozinski, who sits on that court,
3051 refers to it as the "Hollywood Circuit"
—held that Sony would be liable
3052 for the copyright infringement made possible by its machines. Under the
3053 Ninth Circuit's rule, this totally familiar technology
—which Jack
3054 Valenti had called "the Boston Strangler of the American film industry"
3055 (worse yet, it was a
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>Japanese
</em></span> Boston Strangler of the
3056 American film industry)
—was an illegal technology.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2952958" href=
"#ftn.id2952958" class=
"footnote">91</a>]
</sup>
3059 But the Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Ninth Circuit. And in
3060 its reversal, the Court clearly articulated its understanding of when and
3061 whether courts should intervene in such disputes. As the Court wrote,
3062 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
3063 Sound policy, as well as history, supports our consistent deference to
3064 Congress when major technological innovations alter the market for
3065 copyrighted materials. Congress has the constitutional authority and the
3066 institutional ability to accommodate fully the varied permutations of
3067 competing interests that are inevitably implicated by such new
3068 technology.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953004" href=
"#ftn.id2953004" class=
"footnote">92</a>]
</sup>
3069 </p></blockquote></div><p>
3070 Congress was asked to respond to the Supreme Court's decision. But as with
3071 the plea of recording artists about radio broadcasts, Congress ignored the
3072 request. Congress was convinced that American film got enough, this "taking"
3073 notwithstanding. If we put these cases together, a pattern is clear:
3074 </p><div class=
"table"><a name=
"t1"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Tabell
6.1. Tabell
</b></p><div class=
"table-contents"><table summary=
"Tabell" border=
"1"><colgroup><col><col><col><col></colgroup><thead><tr><th align=
"char">CASE
</th><th align=
"char">WHOSE VALUE WAS "PIRATED"
</th><th align=
"char">RESPONSE OF THE COURTS
</th><th align=
"char">RESPONSE OF CONGRESS
</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td align=
"char">Innspillinger
</td><td align=
"char">Komponister
</td><td align=
"char">Ingen beskyttelse
</td><td align=
"char">Statutory license
</td></tr><tr><td align=
"char">Radio
</td><td align=
"char">Innspillingsartister
</td><td align=
"char">N/A
</td><td align=
"char">Ingenting
</td></tr><tr><td align=
"char">Kabel-TV
</td><td align=
"char">Kringkastere
</td><td align=
"char">Ingen beskyttelse
</td><td align=
"char">Statutory license
</td></tr><tr><td align=
"char">VCR
</td><td align=
"char">Filmskapere
</td><td align=
"char">Ingen beskyttelse
</td><td align=
"char">Ingenting
</td></tr></tbody></table></div></div><br class=
"table-break"><p>
3075 In each case throughout our history, a new technology changed the way
3076 content was distributed.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953133" href=
"#ftn.id2953133" class=
"footnote">93</a>]
</sup> In each case,
3077 throughout our history, that change meant that someone got a "free ride" on
3078 someone else's work.
3081 In
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>none
</em></span> of these cases did either the courts or
3082 Congress eliminate all free riding. In
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>none
</em></span> of these
3083 cases did the courts or Congress insist that the law should assure that the
3084 copyright holder get all the value that his copyright created. In every
3085 case, the copyright owners complained of "piracy." In every case, Congress
3086 acted to recognize some of the legitimacy in the behavior of the "pirates."
3087 In each case, Congress allowed some new technology to benefit from content
3088 made before. It balanced the interests at stake.
3091 When you think across these examples, and the other examples that make up
3092 the first four chapters of this section, this balance makes sense. Was Walt
3093 Disney a pirate? Would doujinshi be better if creators had to ask
3094 permission? Should tools that enable others to capture and spread images as
3095 a way to cultivate or criticize our culture be better regulated? Is it
3096 really right that building a search engine should expose you to $
15 million
3097 in damages? Would it have been better if Edison had controlled film? Should
3098 every cover band have to hire a lawyer to get permission to record a song?
3100 We could answer yes to each of these questions, but our tradition has
3101 answered no. In our tradition, as the Supreme Court has stated, copyright
3102 "has never accorded the copyright owner complete control over all possible
3103 uses of his work."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953213" href=
"#ftn.id2953213" class=
"footnote">94</a>]
</sup> Instead, the
3104 particular uses that the law regulates have been defined by balancing the
3105 good that comes from granting an exclusive right against the burdens such an
3106 exclusive right creates. And this balancing has historically been done
3107 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>after
</em></span> a technology has matured, or settled into the mix
3108 of technologies that facilitate the distribution of content.
3110 We should be doing the same thing today. The technology of the Internet is
3111 changing quickly. The way people connect to the Internet (wires
3112 vs. wireless) is changing very quickly. No doubt the network should not
3113 become a tool for "stealing" from artists. But neither should the law become
3114 a tool to entrench one particular way in which artists (or more accurately,
3115 distributors) get paid. As I describe in some detail in the last chapter of
3116 this book, we should be securing income to artists while we allow the market
3117 to secure the most efficient way to promote and distribute content. This
3118 will require changes in the law, at least in the interim. These changes
3119 should be designed to balance the protection of the law against the strong
3120 public interest that innovation continue.
3124 This is especially true when a new technology enables a vastly superior mode
3125 of distribution. And this p2p has done. P2p technologies can be ideally
3126 efficient in moving content across a widely diverse network. Left to
3127 develop, they could make the network vastly more efficient. Yet these
3128 "potential public benefits," as John Schwartz writes in
<em class=
"citetitle">The New
3129 York Times
</em>, "could be delayed in the P2P fight."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953264" href=
"#ftn.id2953264" class=
"footnote">95</a>]
</sup> Yet when anyone begins to talk about "balance," the
3130 copyright warriors raise a different argument. "All this hand waving about
3131 balance and incentives," they say, "misses a fundamental point. Our
3132 content," the warriors insist, "is our
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>property
</em></span>. Why
3133 should we wait for Congress to `rebalance' our property rights? Do you have
3134 to wait before calling the police when your car has been stolen? And why
3135 should Congress deliberate at all about the merits of this theft? Do we ask
3136 whether the car thief had a good use for the car before we arrest him?"
3138 "It is
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>our property
</em></span>," the warriors insist. "And it
3139 should be protected just as any other property is protected."
3140 </p></div><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951663" href=
"#id2951663" class=
"para">70</a>]
</sup>
3143 See IFPI (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry),
3144 <em class=
"citetitle">The Recording Industry Commercial Piracy Report
2003</em>,
3145 July
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
3146 #
14</a>. See also Ben Hunt, "Companies Warned on Music Piracy Risk,"
3147 <em class=
"citetitle">Financial Times
</em>,
14 February
2003,
11.
3148 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951788" href=
"#id2951788" class=
"para">71</a>]
</sup>
3150 See Peter Drahos with John Braithwaite, Information Feudalism:
3151 <em class=
"citetitle">Who Owns the Knowledge Economy?
</em> (New York: The New
3152 Press,
2003),
10–13,
209. The Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual
3153 Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement obligates member nations to create
3154 administrative and enforcement mechanisms for intellectual property rights,
3155 a costly proposition for developing countries. Additionally, patent rights
3156 may lead to higher prices for staple industries such as agriculture. Critics
3157 of TRIPS question the disparity between burdens imposed upon developing
3158 countries and benefits conferred to industrialized nations. TRIPS does
3159 permit governments to use patents for public, noncommercial uses without
3160 first obtaining the patent holder's permission. Developing nations may be
3161 able to use this to gain the benefits of foreign patents at lower
3162 prices. This is a promising strategy for developing nations within the TRIPS
3163 framework.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951132"></a>
3164 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2951833" href=
"#id2951833" class=
"para">72</a>]
</sup>
3166 For an analysis of the economic impact of copying technology, see Stan
3167 Liebowitz,
<em class=
"citetitle">Rethinking the Network Economy
</em> (New York:
3168 Amacom,
2002),
144–90. "In some instances . . . the impact of piracy
3169 on the copyright holder's ability to appropriate the value of the work will
3170 be negligible. One obvious instance is the case where the individual
3171 engaging in pirating would not have purchased an original even if pirating
3172 were not an option." Ibid.,
149.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951797"></a>
3173 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952046" href=
"#id2952046" class=
"para">73</a>]
</sup>
3176 <em class=
"citetitle">Bach
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Longman
</em>,
98
3177 Eng. Rep.
1274 (
1777).
3178 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952070" href=
"#id2952070" class=
"para">74</a>]
</sup>
3180 See Clayton M. Christensen,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Innovator's Dilemma: The
3181 Revolutionary National Bestseller That Changed the Way We Do
3182 Business
</em> (New York: HarperBusiness,
2000). Professor Christensen
3183 examines why companies that give rise to and dominate a product area are
3184 frequently unable to come up with the most creative, paradigm-shifting uses
3185 for their own products. This job usually falls to outside innovators, who
3186 reassemble existing technology in inventive ways. For a discussion of
3187 Christensen's ideas, see Lawrence Lessig,
<em class=
"citetitle">Future
</em>,
3188 89–92,
139.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2951842"></a>
3189 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952112" href=
"#id2952112" class=
"para">75</a>]
</sup>
3192 See Carolyn Lochhead, "Silicon Valley Dream, Hollywood Nightmare,"
3193 <em class=
"citetitle">San Francisco Chronicle
</em>,
24 September
2002, A1; "Rock
3194 'n' Roll Suicide,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New Scientist
</em>,
6 July
2002,
42;
3195 Benny Evangelista, "Napster Names CEO, Secures New Financing,"
3196 <em class=
"citetitle">San Francisco Chronicle
</em>,
23 May
2003, C1; "Napster's
3197 Wake-Up Call,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Economist
</em>,
24 June
2000,
23; John
3198 Naughton, "Hollywood at War with the Internet" (London)
3199 <em class=
"citetitle">Times
</em>,
26 July
2002,
18.
3200 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952148" href=
"#id2952148" class=
"para">76</a>]
</sup>
3204 See Ipsos-Insight,
<em class=
"citetitle">TEMPO: Keeping Pace with Online Music
3205 Distribution
</em> (September
2002), reporting that
28 percent of
3206 Americans aged twelve and older have downloaded music off of the Internet
3207 and
30 percent have listened to digital music files stored on their
3209 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952176" href=
"#id2952176" class=
"para">77</a>]
</sup>
3212 Amy Harmon, "Industry Offers a Carrot in Online Music Fight,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New
3213 York Times
</em>,
6 June
2003, A1.
3214 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952298" href=
"#id2952298" class=
"para">78</a>]
</sup>
3216 See Liebowitz,
<em class=
"citetitle">Rethinking the Network Economy
</em>,
3217 148–49.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2952088"></a>
3218 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952342" href=
"#id2952342" class=
"para">79</a>]
</sup>
3221 See Cap Gemini Ernst
& Young,
<em class=
"citetitle">Technology Evolution and the
3222 Music Industry's Business Model Crisis
</em> (
2003),
3. This report
3223 describes the music industry's effort to stigmatize the budding practice of
3224 cassette taping in the
1970s, including an advertising campaign featuring a
3225 cassette-shape skull and the caption "Home taping is killing music." At the
3226 time digital audio tape became a threat, the Office of Technical Assessment
3227 conducted a survey of consumer behavior. In
1988,
40 percent of consumers
3228 older than ten had taped music to a cassette format. U.S. Congress, Office
3229 of Technology Assessment,
<em class=
"citetitle">Copyright and Home Copying: Technology
3230 Challenges the Law
</em>, OTA-CIT-
422 (Washington, D.C.: U.S.
3231 Government Printing Office, October
1989),
145–56.
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952380" href=
"#id2952380" class=
"para">80</a>]
</sup>
3234 U.S. Congress,
<em class=
"citetitle">Copyright and Home Copying
</em>,
4.
3235 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952436" href=
"#id2952436" class=
"para">81</a>]
</sup>
3238 See Recording Industry Association of America,
<em class=
"citetitle">2002 Yearend
3239 Statistics
</em>, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
15</a>. A later report
3240 indicates even greater losses. See Recording Industry Association of
3241 America,
<em class=
"citetitle">Some Facts About Music Piracy
</em>,
25 June
2003,
3242 available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
16</a>:
3243 "In the past four years, unit shipments of recorded music have fallen by
26
3244 percent from
1.16 billion units in to
860 million units in
2002 in the
3245 United States (based on units shipped). In terms of sales, revenues are
3246 down
14 percent, from $
14.6 billion in to $
12.6 billion last year (based on
3247 U.S. dollar value of shipments). The music industry worldwide has gone from
3248 a $
39 billion industry in
2000 down to a $
32 billion industry in
2002 (based
3249 on U.S. dollar value of shipments)."
3250 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952489" href=
"#id2952489" class=
"para">82</a>]
</sup>
3251 Jane Black, "Big Music's Broken Record," BusinessWeek online,
13. februar
3252 2003, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
3253 #
17</a>.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2952503"></a>
3254 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952522" href=
"#id2952522" class=
"para">83</a>]
</sup>
3258 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952546" href=
"#id2952546" class=
"para">84</a>]
</sup>
3261 By one estimate,
75 percent of the music released by the major labels is no
3262 longer in print. See Online Entertainment and Copyright Law
—Coming
3263 Soon to a Digital Device Near You: Hearing Before the Senate Committee on
3264 the Judiciary,
107th Cong.,
1st sess. (
3 April
2001) (prepared statement of
3265 the Future of Music Coalition), available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
18</a>.
3266 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952602" href=
"#id2952602" class=
"para">85</a>]
</sup>
3269 While there are not good estimates of the number of used record stores in
3270 existence, in
2002, there were
7,
198 used book dealers in the United States,
3271 an increase of
20 percent since
1993. See Book Hunter Press,
<em class=
"citetitle">The
3272 Quiet Revolution: The Expansion of the Used Book Market
</em> (
2002),
3273 available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
3274 #
19</a>. Used records accounted for $
260 million in sales in
2002. See
3275 National Association of Recording Merchandisers, "
2002 Annual Survey
3276 Results," available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
3278 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952752" href=
"#id2952752" class=
"para">86</a>]
</sup>
3281 See Transcript of Proceedings, In Re: Napster Copyright Litigation at
34-
35
3282 (N.D. Cal.,
11 July
2001), nos. MDL-
00-
1369 MHP, C
99-
5183 MHP, available at
3283 <a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
21</a>. For an account
3284 of the litigation and its toll on Napster, see Joseph Menn,
<em class=
"citetitle">All
3285 the Rave: The Rise and Fall of Shawn Fanning's Napster
</em> (New
3286 York: Crown Business,
2003),
269–82.
3287 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952898" href=
"#id2952898" class=
"para">87</a>]
</sup>
3290 Copyright Infringements (Audio and Video Recorders): Hearing on S.
1758
3291 Before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary,
97th Cong.,
1st and
2nd sess.,
3292 459 (
1982) (testimony of Jack Valenti, president, Motion Picture Association
3294 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952915" href=
"#id2952915" class=
"para">88</a>]
</sup>
3297 Copyright Infringements (Audio and Video Recorders),
475.
3298 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952924" href=
"#id2952924" class=
"para">89</a>]
</sup>
3301 <em class=
"citetitle">Universal City Studios, Inc
</em>. v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Sony
3302 Corp. of America
</em>,
480 F. Supp.
429, (C.D. Cal.,
1979).
3303 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952832" href=
"#id2952832" class=
"para">90</a>]
</sup>
3306 Copyright Infringements (Audio and Video Recorders),
485 (testimony of Jack
3308 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2952958" href=
"#id2952958" class=
"para">91</a>]
</sup>
3311 <em class=
"citetitle">Universal City Studios, Inc
</em>. v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Sony
3312 Corp. of America
</em>,
659 F.
2d
963 (
9th Cir.
1981).
3313 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953004" href=
"#id2953004" class=
"para">92</a>]
</sup>
3316 <em class=
"citetitle">Sony Corp. of America
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Universal City
3317 Studios, Inc
</em>.,
464 U.S.
417,
431 (
1984).
3318 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953133" href=
"#id2953133" class=
"para">93</a>]
</sup>
3320 These are the most important instances in our history, but there are other
3321 cases as well. The technology of digital audio tape (DAT), for example, was
3322 regulated by Congress to minimize the risk of piracy. The remedy Congress
3323 imposed did burden DAT producers, by taxing tape sales and controlling the
3324 technology of DAT. See Audio Home Recording Act of
1992 (Title
17 of the
3325 <em class=
"citetitle">United States Code
</em>), Pub. L. No.
102-
563,
106 Stat.
3326 4237, codified at
17 U.S.C. §
1001. Again, however, this regulation did not
3327 eliminate the opportunity for free riding in the sense I've described. See
3328 Lessig,
<em class=
"citetitle">Future
</em>,
71. See also Picker, "From Edison to
3329 the Broadcast Flag,"
<em class=
"citetitle">University of Chicago Law Review
</em>
3330 70 (
2003):
293–96.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2952775"></a>
3331 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953213" href=
"#id2953213" class=
"para">94</a>]
</sup>
3334 <em class=
"citetitle">Sony Corp. of America
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Universal City
3335 Studios, Inc
</em>.,
464 U.S.
417, (
1984).
3336 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953264" href=
"#id2953264" class=
"para">95</a>]
</sup>
3339 John Schwartz, "New Economy: The Attack on Peer-to-Peer Software Echoes Past
3340 Efforts,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New York Times
</em>,
22 September
2003, C3.
3341 </p></div></div></div></div><div class=
"part" title='Del II.
"Eiendom"'
><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h1 class=
"title"><a name=
"c-property"></a>Del II. "Eiendom"
</h1></div></div></div><div class=
"partintro" title='
"Eiendom"'
><div></div><p>
3345 The copyright warriors are right: A copyright is a kind of property. It can
3346 be owned and sold, and the law protects against its theft. Ordinarily, the
3347 copyright owner gets to hold out for any price he wants. Markets reckon the
3348 supply and demand that partially determine the price she can get.
3350 But in ordinary language, to call a copyright a "property" right is a bit
3351 misleading, for the property of copyright is an odd kind of property.
3352 Indeed, the very idea of property in any idea or any expression is very
3353 odd. I understand what I am taking when I take the picnic table you put in
3354 your backyard. I am taking a thing, the picnic table, and after I take it,
3355 you don't have it. But what am I taking when I take the good
3356 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>idea
</em></span> you had to put a picnic table in the
3357 backyard
—by, for example, going to Sears, buying a table, and putting
3358 it in my backyard? What is the thing I am taking then?
3360 The point is not just about the thingness of picnic tables versus ideas,
3361 though that's an important difference. The point instead is that in the
3362 ordinary case
—indeed, in practically every case except for a narrow
3363 range of exceptions
—ideas released to the world are free. I don't take
3364 anything from you when I copy the way you dress
—though I might seem
3365 weird if I did it every day, and especially weird if you are a
3366 woman. Instead, as Thomas Jefferson said (and as is especially true when I
3367 copy the way someone else dresses), "He who receives an idea from me,
3368 receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his
3369 taper at mine, receives light without darkening me."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953338" href=
"#ftn.id2953338" class=
"footnote">96</a>]
</sup>
3371 The exceptions to free use are ideas and expressions within the reach of the
3372 law of patent and copyright, and a few other domains that I won't discuss
3373 here. Here the law says you can't take my idea or expression without my
3374 permission: The law turns the intangible into property.
3376 But how, and to what extent, and in what form
—the details, in other
3377 words
—matter. To get a good sense of how this practice of turning the
3378 intangible into property emerged, we need to place this "property" in its
3379 proper context.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953383" href=
"#ftn.id2953383" class=
"footnote">97</a>]
</sup>
3381 My strategy in doing this will be the same as my strategy in the preceding
3382 part. I offer four stories to help put the idea of "copyright material is
3383 property" in context. Where did the idea come from? What are its limits? How
3384 does it function in practice? After these stories, the significance of this
3385 true statement
—"copyright material is property"
— will be a bit
3386 more clear, and its implications will be revealed as quite different from
3387 the implications that the copyright warriors would have us draw.
3388 </p><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#founders">7. Kapittel seks: Grunnleggerne
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#recorders">8. Kapittel sju: Innspillerne
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#transformers">9. Kapittel åtte: Omformere
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#collectors">10. Kapittel ni: Samlere
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#property-i">11. Kapittel ti:
"Eiendom"</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#hollywood">Hvorfor Hollywood har rett
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#beginnings">Opphav
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawduration">Loven: Varighet
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawscope">Loven: Virkeområde
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawreach">Lov og arkitektur: Rekkevidde
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawforce">Arkitektur og lov: Makt
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#marketconcentration">Marked: Konsentrasjon
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#together">Sammen
</a></span></dt></dl></dd></dl></div><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953338" href=
"#id2953338" class=
"para">96</a>]
</sup>
3391 Letter from Thomas Jefferson to Isaac McPherson (
13 August
1813) in
3392 <em class=
"citetitle">The Writings of Thomas Jefferson
</em>, vol.
6 (Andrew
3393 A. Lipscomb and Albert Ellery Bergh, eds.,
1903),
330,
333–34.
3394 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953383" href=
"#id2953383" class=
"para">97</a>]
</sup>
3397 As the legal realists taught American law, all property rights are
3398 intangible. A property right is simply a right that an individual has
3399 against the world to do or not do certain things that may or may not attach
3400 to a physical object. The right itself is intangible, even if the object to
3401 which it is (metaphorically) attached is tangible. See Adam Mossoff, "What
3402 Is Property? Putting the Pieces Back Together,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Arizona Law
3403 Review
</em> 45 (
2003):
373,
429 n.
241.
3404 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 7. Kapittel seks: Grunnleggerne"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"founders"></a>Kapittel
7. Kapittel seks: Grunnleggerne
</h2></div></div></div><p>
3405 William Shakespeare skrev
<em class=
"citetitle">Romeo og Julie
</em> i
3406 1595. Skuespillet ble først utgitt i
1597. Det var det ellevte store
3407 skuespillet Shakespeare hadde skrevet. Han fortsatte å skrive skuespill helt
3408 til
1613, og stykkene han skrevhar fortsatt å definere angloamerikansk
3409 kultur siden. Så dypt har verkene av en
1500-talls forfatter sunket inn i
3410 vår kultur at vi ofte ikke engang kjenner kilden. Jeg overhørte en gang noen
3411 som kommentere Kenneth Branaghs utgave av Henry V: "Jeg likte det, men
3412 Shakespeare er så full av klisjeer."
3415 I
1774, nesten
180 år etter at
<em class=
"citetitle">Romeo og Julie
</em> ble
3416 skrevet, mente mange at "opphavsretten" kun tilhørte én eneste utgiver i
3417 London, John Tonson.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953458" href=
"#ftn.id2953458" class=
"footnote">98</a>]
</sup> Tonson var den
3418 mest fremstående av en liten gruppe utgivere kalt "the Conger"
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953488" href=
"#ftn.id2953488" class=
"footnote">99</a>]
</sup>, som kontrollerte boksalget i England gjennom hele
3419 1700-tallet. The Conger hevdet at de hadde en evigvarende rett over "kopier"
3420 av bøker de hadde fått av forfatterne. Denne evigvarende retten innebar at
3421 ingen andre kunne publisere kopier av disse bøkene. Slik ble prisen på
3422 klassiske bøker holdt oppe; alle konkurrenter som lagde bedre eller
3423 billigere utgaver, ble fjernet.
3425 Men altså, det er noe spennende med året
1774 for alle som vet litt om
3426 opphavsretts-lovgivning. Det mest kjente året for opphavsrett er
1710, da
3427 det britiske parlamentet vedtok den første loven. Denne loven er kjent som
3428 "Statute of Anne" og sa at alle publiserte verk skulle være beskyttet i
3429 fjorten år, en periode som kunne fornyes én gang dersom forfatteren ennå
3430 levde, og at alle verk publisert i eller før
1710 skulle ha en ekstraperiode
3431 på
22 tillegsår.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953526" href=
"#ftn.id2953526" class=
"footnote">100</a>]
</sup> På grunn av denne
3432 loven, så skulle
<em class=
"citetitle">Rome og Julie
</em> ha falt i det fri i
3433 1731. Hvordan kunne da Tonson fortsatt ha kontroll over verket i
1774?
3435 The reason is that the English hadn't yet agreed on what a "copyright"
3436 was
—indeed, no one had. At the time the English passed the Statute of
3437 Anne, there was no other legislation governing copyrights. The last law
3438 regulating publishers, the Licensing Act of
1662, had expired in
1695. That
3439 law gave publishers a monopoly over publishing, as a way to make it easier
3440 for the Crown to control what was published. But after it expired, there
3441 was no positive law that said that the publishers, or "Stationers," had an
3442 exclusive right to print books.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2953347"></a>
3444 At det ikke fantes noen
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>positiv
</em></span> lov, betydde ikke at
3445 det ikke fantes noen lov. Den anglo-amerikanske juridiske tradisjon ser både
3446 til lover skapt av politikere (det lovgivende statsorgen)og til lover
3447 (prejudikater) skapt av domstolene for å bestemme hvordan folket skal
3448 leve. Vi kaller politikernes lover for positiv lov og vi kaller lovene fra
3449 dommerne sedvanerett."Common law" angir bakgrunnen for de lovgivendes
3450 lovgivning; retten til lovgiving, vanligvis kan trumfe at bakgrunnen bare
3451 hvis det går gjennom en lov til å forskyve den. Og så var det virkelige
3452 spørsmålet etter lisensiering lover hadde utløpt om felles lov beskyttet
3453 opphavsretten, uavhengig av lovverket positiv.
3456 Dette spørsmålet var viktig for utgiverne eller "bokselgere," som de ble
3457 kalt, fordi det var økende konkurranse fra utenlandske utgivere, Særlig fra
3458 Skottland hvor publiseringen og eksporten av bøker til England hadde økt
3459 veldig. Denne konkurransen reduserte fortjenesten til "The Conger", som
3460 derfor krevde at parlamentet igjen skulle vedta en lov for å gi dem
3461 eksklusiv kontroll over publisering. Dette kravet resulterte i "Statute of
3464 "Statute of Anne" ga forfatteren eller "eieren" av en bok en eksklusiv rett
3465 til å publisere denne boken. Men det var, til bokhandernes forferdelse en
3466 viktig begrensning, nemlig hvor lenge denne retten skulle vare. Etter dette
3467 gikk trykkeretten bort og verket falt i det fri og kunne trykkes av hvem som
3468 helst. Det var ihvertfall det lovgiverne hadde tenkt.
3470 Men nå det mest interessante med dette: Hvorfor ville parlamentet begrense
3471 trykkeretten? Sprøsmålet er ikke hvorfor de bestemte seg for denne perioden,
3472 men hvorfor ville de begrense retten
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>i det hele tatt?
</em></span>
3474 Bokhandlerne, og forfatterne som de representerte, hadde et veldig sterkt
3475 krav. Ta
<em class=
"citetitle">romeo og Julie
</em> som et eksempel: Skuespillet
3476 ble skrevet av Shakespeare. Det var hans kreativitet som brakte det til
3477 verden. Han krenket ikke noens rett da han skrev dette verket (det er en
3478 kontroversiell påstanden, men det er urelevant), og med sin egen rett skapte
3479 han verket, han gjorde det ikke noe vanskeligere for andre til å lage
3480 skuespill. Så hvorfor skulle loven tillate at noen annen kunne komme og ta
3481 Shakespeares verkuten hans, eller hans arvingers, tillatelse? Hvilke grunner
3482 finnes for å tillate at noen "stjeler" Shakespeares verk?
3484 Svaret er todel. Først må vi se på noe spesielt med oppfatningen av
3485 opphavsrett som fantes på tidspunktet da "Statute of Anne" ble
3486 vedtatt. Deretter må vi se på noe spesielt med bokhandlerne.
3489 Først om opphavsretten. I de siste tre hundre år har vi kommet til å bruke
3490 begrepet "copyright" i stadig videre forstand. Men i
1710 var det ikke så
3491 mye et konsept som det var en bestemt rett. Opphavsretten ble født som et
3492 svært spesifikt sett med begrensninger: den forbød andre å reprodusere en
3493 bok. I
1710 var "kopi-rett" en rett til å bruke en bestemt maskin til å
3494 replikere en bestemt arbeid. Den gikk ikke utover dette svært smale
3495 formålet. Den kontrollerte ikke mer generelt hvordan et verk kunne
3496 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>brukes
</em></span>. Idag inkluderer retten en stor samling av
3497 restriksjoner på andres frihet: den gir forfatteren eksklusiv rett til å
3498 kopiere, eksklusiv rett til å distribuere, eksklusiv rett til å fremføre, og
3501 Så selv om f. eks. opphavsretten til Shakespeares verker var evigvarende,
3502 betydde det under den opprinnelige betydningen av begrepet at ingen kunne
3503 trykke Shakespeares arbeid uten tillatelse fra Shakespeares arvinger. Den
3504 ville ikke ha kontrollert noe mer, for eksempel om hvordan verket kunne
3505 fremføres, om verket kunne oversettes eller om Kenneth Branagh ville hatt
3506 lov til å lage filmer. "Kopi-retten" var bare en eksklusiv rett til å
3507 trykke--ikke noe mindre, selvfølgelig, men heller ikke mer.
3509 Selv dnne begrensede retten ble møtt med skepsis av britene. De hadde hatt
3510 en lang og stygg erfaring med "eksklusive rettigheter," spesielt "enerett"
3511 gitt av kronen. Engelskmennene hadde utkjempet en borgerkrig delvis mot
3512 kronens praksis med å dele ut monopoler--spesielt monopoler for verk som
3513 allerede eksisterte. Kong Henrik VIII hadde gitt patent til å trykke Bibelen
3514 og monopol til Darcy for å lage spillkort. Det engelske parlamentet begynte
3515 å kjempe tilbake mot denne makten hos kronen. I
1656 ble "Statute of
3516 Monopolis" vedtatt for å begrense monopolene på patenter for nye
3517 oppfinnelser. Og i
1710 var parlamentet ivrig etter å håndtere det voksende
3518 monopolet på publisering.
3520 Dermed ble "kopi-retten", når den sees på som en monopolrett, en rettighet
3521 som bør være begrenset. (Uansett hvor overbevisende påstanden om at "det er
3522 min eiendom, og jeg skal ha for alltid," prøv hvor overbevisende det er når
3523 men sier "det er mitt monopol, og jeg skal ha det for alltid.") Staten ville
3524 beskytte eneretten, men bare så lenge det gavnet samfunnet. Britene så
3525 skadene særinteresserte kunne skape; de vedtok en lov for å stoppe dem.
3527 Dernest, om bokhandlerne. Det var ikke bare at kopiretten var et
3528 monopol. Det var også et monopol holdt av bokhandlerne. En bokhandler høres
3529 greie og ufarlige ut for oss, men slik var det ikke i syttenhundretallets
3530 England. Medlemmene i "the Conger" ble av en voksende mengde sett på som
3531 monopolister av verste sort - et verktøy for kronens undertrykkelse, de
3532 solgte Englands frihet mot å være garantert en monopolskinntekt. Men
3533 monopolistene ble kvast kritisert: Milton beskrev dem som "gamle
3534 patentholdere og monopolister i bokhandlerkunsten"; de var "menn som derfor
3535 ikke hadde et ærlig arbeide hvor utdanning er nødvendig."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953768" href=
"#ftn.id2953768" class=
"footnote">101</a>]
</sup>
3537 Mange trodde at den makten bokhandlerne utøvde over spredning av kunnskap,
3538 var til skade for selve spredningen, men på dette tidspunktet viste
3539 Opplysningen viktigheten av utdannelse og kunnskap for alle. idéen om at
3540 kunnskap burde være gratis er et kjennetegn for tiden, og disse kraftige
3541 kommersielle interesser forstyrret denne idéen.
3543 For å balansere denne makten, besluttet Parlamentet å øke konkurransen blant
3544 bokhandlerne, og den enkleste måten å gjøre det på, var å spre mengden av
3545 verdifulle bøker. Parlamentet begrenset derfor begrepet om opphavsrett, og
3546 garantert slik at verdifulle bøker ville bli frie for alle utgiver å
3547 publisere etter en begrenset periode. Slik ble det å gi eksisterende verk en
3548 periode på tjueen år et kompromiss for å bekjempe bokhandlernes
3549 makt. Begrensninger med dato var en indirekte måte å skape konkurranse
3550 mellom utgivere, og slik en skapelse og spredning av kultur.
3552 Når
1731 (
1710+
21) kom, ble bokhandlerne engstelige. De så konsekvensene av
3553 mer konkurranse, og som alle konkurrenter, likte de det ikke. Først
3554 ignorerte bokhandlere ganske enkelt "Statute of Anne", og fortsatte å kreve
3555 en evigvarende rett til å kontrollere publiseringen. Men i
1735 og
1737 de
3556 prøvde å tvinge Parlamentet til å utvide periodene. Tjueen år var ikke nok,
3557 sa de; de trengte mer tid.
3559 Parlamentet avslo kravene, Som en pamflett sa, i en vending som levere ennå
3561 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
3562 Jeg ser ingen grunn til å gi en utvidet perioden nå som ikke ville kunne gi
3563 utvidelser om igjen og om igjen, så fort de gamle utgår; så dersom dette
3564 lovforslaget blir vedtatt, vil effekten være: at et evig monopol blir skapt,
3565 et stort nederlag for handelen, et angrep mot kunnskapen, ingen fordel for
3566 forfatterne, men en stor avgift for folket; og alt dette kun for å øke
3567 bokhandlernes personlige rikdom.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953846" href=
"#ftn.id2953846" class=
"footnote">102</a>]
</sup>
3568 </p></blockquote></div><p>
3569 Etter å ha mislyktes i Parlamentet gikk utgiverne til rettssalen i en rekke
3570 saker. Deres argument var enkelt og direkte: "Statute of Anne" ga
3571 forfatterne en viss beskyttelse gjennom positiv loven, men denne
3572 beskyttelsenvar ikke ment som en erstatning for felles lov. Istedet var de
3573 ment å supplere felles lov. Ifølge sedvanerett var det galt å ta en annen
3574 persons kreative eiendom og bruke den uten hans tillatelse. "Statute of
3575 Anne", hevdet bokhandlere, endret ikke dette faktum. Derfor betydde ikke det
3576 at beskyttelsen gitt av "Statute of Anne" utløp, at beskyttelsen fra
3577 sedvaneretten utløp: Ifølge sedvaneretten hadde de rett til å fordømme
3578 publiseringen av en bok, selv følgelig om "Statute of Anne" sa at de var
3579 falt i det fri. Dette, mente de, var den eneste måten å beskytte
3582 Dette var et godt argument, og hadde støtte fra flere av den tidens ledende
3583 jurister. Det viste også en ekstraordinær chutzpah. Inntail da, som
3584 jusprofessor Raymond Pattetson har sagt, "var utgiverne ... like bekymret
3585 for forfatterne som en gjeter for sine lam."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953912" href=
"#ftn.id2953912" class=
"footnote">103</a>]
</sup> Bokselgerne brydde seg ikke det spor om forfatternes
3586 rettigheter. Deres bekymring var den monopolske inntekten forfatterens verk
3589 Men bokhandlernes argument ble ikke godtatt uten kamp. Helten fra denne
3590 kampen var den skotske bokselgeren Alexander Donaldson.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953939" href=
"#ftn.id2953939" class=
"footnote">104</a>]
</sup>
3592 Donaldson var en fremmed for Londons "the Conger". Han startet in karriere i
3593 Edinburgh i
1750. Hans forretningsidé var billige kopier av standardverk
3594 falt i det fri, ihvertfall fri ifølge "Statute of Anne".
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953962" href=
"#ftn.id2953962" class=
"footnote">105</a>]
</sup> Donaldsons forlag vokste og ble "et sentrum for
3595 litterære skotter." "Blant dem," skriver professor Mark Rose, var "den unge
3596 James Boswell som, sammen med sin venn Andrew Erskine, publiserte en hel
3597 antologi av skotsk samtidspoesi sammen med Donaldson."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2953981" href=
"#ftn.id2953981" class=
"footnote">106</a>]
</sup> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2953989"></a>
3599 Da Londons bokselgere prøvde å få stengt Donaldsons butikk i Skottland, så
3600 flyttet han butikken til London. Her solgte han billige utgaver av "de mest
3601 populære, engelske bøker, i kamp mot sedvanerettens rett til litterær
3602 eiendom."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2954007" href=
"#ftn.id2954007" class=
"footnote">107</a>]
</sup> Bøkene hans var mellom
30%
3603 og
50% billigere enn "the Conger"s, og han baserte sin rett til denne
3604 konkurransen på at bøkene, takket være "Statute of Anne", var falt i det
3607 Londons bokselgere begynte straks å slå ned mot "pirater" som
3608 Donaldson. Flere tiltak var vellykkede, den viktigste var den tidlig seieren
3609 i kampen mellom
<em class=
"citetitle">Millar
</em> og
3610 <em class=
"citetitle">Taylor
</em>.
3612 Millar var en bokhandler som i
1729 hadde kjøpt opp rettighetene til James
3613 Thomsons dikt "The Seasons". Millar hadde da full beskyttelse gjennom
3614 "Statute of Anne", men etter at denne beskyttelsen var uløpt, begynte Robert
3615 Taylor å trykke et konkurrerende bind. Millar gikk til sak, og hevdet han
3616 hadde en evig rett gjennom sedvaneretten, uansett hva "Statute of Anne"
3617 sa.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2954052" href=
"#ftn.id2954052" class=
"footnote">108</a>]
</sup>
3618 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxmansfield2"></a><p>
3619 Til moderne juristers forbløffelse, var en av, ikke bare datidens, men en av
3620 de største dommere i engelsk historie, Lord Mansfield, enig med
3621 bokhandlerne. Uansett hvilken beskyttelse "Statute of Anne" gav
3622 bokhandlerne, så sa han at den ikke fortrengte noe fra
3623 sedvaneretten. Spørsmålet var hvorvidt sedvaneretten beskyttet forfatterne
3624 mot pirater. Mansfield svar var ja: Sedvaneretten nektet Taylor å
3625 reprodusere Thomsons dikt uten Millars tillatelse. Slik gav sedvaneretten
3626 bokselgerne en evig publiseringsrett til bøker solgt til dem.
3629 Ser man på det som et spørsmål innen abstrakt jus - dersom man resonnere som
3630 om rettferdighet bare var logisk deduksjon fra de første bud - kunne
3631 Mansfields konklusjon gitt mening. Men den overså det Parlamentet hadde
3632 kjempet for i
1710: Hvordan man på best mulig vis kunne innskrenke
3633 utgivernes monopolmakt. Parlamentets strategi hadde vært å kjøpe fred
3634 gjennom å tilby en beskyttelsesperiode også for eksisterende verk, men
3635 perioden måtte være så kort at kulturen ble utsatt for konkurranse innen
3636 rimelig tid. Storbritannia skulle vokse fra den kontrollerte kulturen under
3637 kronen, inn i en fri og åpen kultur.
3638 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954119"></a><p>
3639 Kampen for å forsvare "Statute of Anne"s begrensninger sluttet uansett ikke
3640 der, for nå kommer Donaldson.
3641 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954134"></a><p>
3642 Millar døde kort tid etter sin seier. Boet hans solgte rettighetene over
3643 Thomsons dikt til et syndikat av utgivere, deriblant Thomas
3644 Beckett.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2954148" href=
"#ftn.id2954148" class=
"footnote">109</a>]
</sup> Da ga Donaldson ut en
3645 uautorisert utgave av Thomsons verk. Etter avgjørelsen i
3646 <em class=
"citetitle">Millar
</em>-saken, gikk Beckett til sak mot
3647 Donaldson. Donaldson tok saken inn for Overhuset, som da fungerte som en
3648 slags høyesterett. I februar
1774 hadde dette organet muligheten til å tolke
3649 Parlamentets mening med utøpsdatoen fra seksti år før.
3651 Rettssaken
<em class=
"citetitle">Donaldson
</em> mot
3652 <em class=
"citetitle">Beckett
</em> fikk en enorm oppmerksomhet i hele
3653 Storbritannia. Donaldsons advokater mente at selv om det før fantes en del
3654 rettigheter i sedvaneretten, så var disse fortrengt av "Statute of
3655 Anne". Etter at "Statute of Anne" var blitt vedtatt, skulle den eneste
3656 lovlige beskyttelse for trykkerett kom derfra. Og derfor, mente de, i tråd
3657 med vilkårene i "Statute of Anne", falle i det fri så fort
3658 beskyttelsesperioden var over.
3660 Overhuset var en merkelig institusjon. Juridiske spørsmål ble presentert for
3661 huset, og ble først stemt over av "juslorder", medlemmer av enspesiell
3662 rettslig gruppe som fungerte nesten slik som justiariusene i vår
3663 Høyesterett. Deretter, etter at "juslordene" hadde stemt, stemte resten av
3667 Rapportene om juslordene stemmer er uenige. På enkelte punkter ser det ut
3668 som om evigvarende beskyttelse fikk flertall. Men det er ingen tvil om
3669 hvordan resten av Overhuset stemte. Med en majoritet på to mot en (
22 mot
3670 11) stemte de ned forslaget om en evig beskyttelse. Uansett hvordan man
3671 hadde tolket sedvaneretten, var nå kopiretten begrenset til en periode, og
3672 etter denne ville verket falle i det fri.
3674 "Å falle i det fri". Før rettssaken
<em class=
"citetitle">Donaldson
</em> mot
3675 <em class=
"citetitle">Beckett
</em> var det ingen klar oppfatning om hva å falle
3676 i det fri innebar. Før
1774 var det jo en allmenn oppfatning om at
3677 kopiretten var evigvarende. Men etter
1774 ble Public Domain født.For første
3678 gang i angloamerikansk historie var den lovlige beskyttelsen av et verk
3679 utgått, og de største verk i engelsk historie - inkludert Shakespeare,
3680 Bacon, Milton, Johnson og Bunyan - var frie.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954244"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954251"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954257"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954263"></a>
3681 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954269"></a>
3683 Vi kan knapt forestille oss det, men denne avgjørelsen fra Overhuset fyrte
3684 opp under en svært populær og politisk reaksjon. I Skottland, hvor de fleste
3685 piratugiverne hadde holdt til, ble avgjørelsen feiret i gatene. Som
3686 <em class=
"citetitle">Edinburgh Advertiser
</em> skrev "Ingen privatsak har noen
3687 gang fått slik oppmerksomhet fra folket, og ingen sak som har blitt prøvet i
3688 Overhuset har interessert så mange enkeltmennesker." "Stor glede i Edinburgh
3689 etter seieren over litterær eiendom: bål og *illuminations*.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2954298" href=
"#ftn.id2954298" class=
"footnote">110</a>]
</sup>
3691 I London, ihvertfall blant utgiverne, var reaksjonen like sterk, men i
3692 motsatt retning.
<em class=
"citetitle">Morning Chronicle
</em> skrev:
3693 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
3694 Gjennom denne avgjørelsen ... er verdier til nesten
200 000 pund, som er
3695 blitt ærlig kjøpt gjennom allment salg, og som i går var eiendom, er nå
3696 redusert til ingenting. Bokselgerne i London og Westminster, mange av dem
3697 har solgt hus og eiendom for å kjøpe kopirettigheter, er med ett ruinerte,
3698 og mange som gjennom mange år har opparbeidet kompetanse for å brødfø
3699 familien, sitter nå uten en shilling til sine.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2954329" href=
"#ftn.id2954329" class=
"footnote">111</a>]
</sup>
3700 </p></blockquote></div><p>
3703 Ruinert er en overdrivelse. Men det er ingen overdrivelse å si at endringen
3704 var stor. Vedtaket fra Overhuset betydde at bokhandlerne ikke lenger kunnen
3705 kontrollere hvordan kulturen i England ville vokse og utvikle seg. Kulturen
3706 i England var etter dette
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>fri
</em></span>. Ikke i den betydning at
3707 kopiretten ble ignorert, for utgiverne hadde i en begrenset periode rett
3708 over trykkingen. Og heller ikke i den betydningen at bøker kunne stjeles,
3709 for selv etter at boken var falt i det fri, så måtte den kjøpes. Men
3710 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>fri
</em></span> i betydningen at kulturen og dens vekst ikke lenger
3711 var kontrollert av en liten gruppe utgivere. Som alle frie markeder, ville
3712 dette markedet vokse og utvikle seg etter tilbud og etterspørsel. Den
3713 engelske kulturen ble nå formet slik flertallet Englands lesere ville at det
3714 skulle formes - gjennom valget av hva de kjøpte og skrev, gjennom valget av
3715 *memes* de gjentok og beundret. Valg i en
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>konkurrerende
3716 sammenheng
</em></span>, ikke der hvor valgene var om hvilken kultur som
3717 skulle være tilgjengelig for folket og hvor deres tilgang til den ble styrt
3718 av noen få, på tros av flertallets ønsker.
3720 Til sist, dette var en verden hvor Parlamentet var antimonopolistisk, og
3721 holdt stand mot utgivernes krav. I en verden hvor parlamentet er lett å
3722 påvirke, vil den frie kultur være mindre beskyttet.
3723 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953458" href=
"#id2953458" class=
"para">98</a>]
</sup>
3726 Jacob Tonson er vanligvis husket for sin omgang med
1700-tallets litterære
3727 storheter, spesielt John Dryden, og for hans kjekke"ferdige versjoner" av
3728 klassiske verk. I tillegg til
<em class=
"citetitle">Romeo og Julie
</em>, utga
3729 han en utrolig rekke liste av verk som ennå er hjertet av den engelske
3730 kanon, inkludert de samlede verk av Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, John Milton, og
3731 John Dryden. Se Keith Walker: "Jacob Tonson, Bookseller,"
3732 <em class=
"citetitle">American Scholar
</em> 61:
3 (
1992):
424-
31.
3733 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953488" href=
"#id2953488" class=
"para">99</a>]
</sup>
3736 Lyman Ray Patterson,
<em class=
"citetitle">Copyright in Historical
3737 Perspective
</em> (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press,
1968),
3739 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953526" href=
"#id2953526" class=
"para">100</a>]
</sup>
3741 Som Siva Vaidhyanathan så pent argumenterer, er det feilaktige å kalle dette
3742 en "opphavsrettslov." Se Vaidhyanathan,
<em class=
"citetitle">Copyrights and
3743 Copywrongs
</em>,
40.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2953537"></a>
3744 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953768" href=
"#id2953768" class=
"para">101</a>]
</sup>
3748 Philip Wittenberg,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Protection and Marketing of Literary
3749 Property
</em> (New York: J. Messner, Inc.,
1937),
31.
3750 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953846" href=
"#id2953846" class=
"para">102</a>]
</sup>
3753 A Letter to a Member of Parliament concerning the Bill now depending in the
3754 House of Commons, for making more effectual an Act in the Eighth Year of the
3755 Reign of Queen Anne, entitled, An Act for the Encouragement of Learning, by
3756 Vesting the Copies of Printed Books in the Authors or Purchasers of such
3757 Copies, during the Times therein mentioned (London,
1735), in Brief Amici
3758 Curiae of Tyler T. Ochoa et al.,
8,
<em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em>
3759 v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Ashcroft
</em>,
537 U.S.
186 (
2003) (No.
01-
618).
3760 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953912" href=
"#id2953912" class=
"para">103</a>]
</sup>
3762 Lyman Ray Patterson, "Free Speech, Copyright, and Fair Use,"
3763 <em class=
"citetitle">Vanderbilt Law Review
</em> 40 (
1987):
28. For en
3764 fantastisk overbevisende fortelling, se Vaidhyanathan,
37–48.
3765 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2953499"></a>
3766 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953939" href=
"#id2953939" class=
"para">104</a>]
</sup>
3769 For a compelling account, see David Saunders,
<em class=
"citetitle">Authorship and
3770 Copyright
</em> (London: Routledge,
1992),
62–69.
3771 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953962" href=
"#id2953962" class=
"para">105</a>]
</sup>
3774 Mark Rose,
<em class=
"citetitle">Authors and Owners
</em> (Cambridge: Harvard
3775 University Press,
1993),
92.
3776 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2953981" href=
"#id2953981" class=
"para">106</a>]
</sup>
3780 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2954007" href=
"#id2954007" class=
"para">107</a>]
</sup>
3783 Lyman Ray Patterson,
<em class=
"citetitle">Copyright in Historical
3784 Perspective
</em>,
167 (quoting Borwell).
3785 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2954052" href=
"#id2954052" class=
"para">108</a>]
</sup>
3788 Howard B. Abrams, "The Historic Foundation of American Copyright Law:
3789 Exploding the Myth of Common Law Copyright,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Wayne Law
3790 Review
</em> 29 (
1983):
1152.
3791 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2954148" href=
"#id2954148" class=
"para">109</a>]
</sup>
3795 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2954298" href=
"#id2954298" class=
"para">110</a>]
</sup>
3799 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2954329" href=
"#id2954329" class=
"para">111</a>]
</sup>
3803 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 8. Kapittel sju: Innspillerne"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"recorders"></a>Kapittel
8. Kapittel sju: Innspillerne
</h2></div></div></div><p>
3804 Jon Else is a filmmaker. He is best known for his documentaries and has been
3805 very successful in spreading his art. He is also a teacher, and as a teacher
3806 myself, I envy the loyalty and admiration that his students feel for him. (I
3807 met, by accident, two of his students at a dinner party. He was their god.)
3809 Else worked on a documentary that I was involved in. At a break, he told me
3810 a story about the freedom to create with film in America today.
3812 In
1990, Else was working on a documentary about Wagner's Ring Cycle. The
3813 focus was stagehands at the San Francisco Opera. Stagehands are a
3814 particularly funny and colorful element of an opera. During a show, they
3815 hang out below the stage in the grips' lounge and in the lighting loft. They
3816 make a perfect contrast to the art on the stage.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954431"></a>
3819 During one of the performances, Else was shooting some stagehands playing
3820 checkers. In one corner of the room was a television set. Playing on the
3821 television set, while the stagehands played checkers and the opera company
3822 played Wagner, was
<em class=
"citetitle">The Simpsons
</em>. As Else judged it,
3823 this touch of cartoon helped capture the flavor of what was special about
3826 Years later, when he finally got funding to complete the film, Else
3827 attempted to clear the rights for those few seconds of
<em class=
"citetitle">The
3828 Simpsons
</em>. For of course, those few seconds are copyrighted; and
3829 of course, to use copyrighted material you need the permission of the
3830 copyright owner, unless "fair use" or some other privilege applies.
3832 Else called
<em class=
"citetitle">Simpsons
</em> creator Matt Groening's office
3833 to get permission. Groening approved the shot. The shot was a
3834 four-and-a-halfsecond image on a tiny television set in the corner of the
3835 room. How could it hurt? Groening was happy to have it in the film, but he
3836 told Else to contact Gracie Films, the company that produces the program.
3837 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954476"></a>
3839 Gracie Films was okay with it, too, but they, like Groening, wanted to be
3840 careful. So they told Else to contact Fox, Gracie's parent company. Else
3841 called Fox and told them about the clip in the corner of the one room shot
3842 of the film. Matt Groening had already given permission, Else said. He was
3843 just confirming the permission with Fox.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954491"></a>
3845 Then, as Else told me, "two things happened. First we discovered . . . that
3846 Matt Groening doesn't own his own creation
—or at least that someone
3847 [at Fox] believes he doesn't own his own creation." And second, Fox "wanted
3848 ten thousand dollars as a licensing fee for us to use this four-point-five
3849 seconds of . . . entirely unsolicited
<em class=
"citetitle">Simpsons
</em> which
3850 was in the corner of the shot."
3852 Else was certain there was a mistake. He worked his way up to someone he
3853 thought was a vice president for licensing, Rebecca Herrera. He explained
3854 to her, "There must be some mistake here. . . . We're asking for your
3855 educational rate on this." That was the educational rate, Herrera told
3856 Else. A day or so later, Else called again to confirm what he had been told.
3859 "I wanted to make sure I had my facts straight," he told me. "Yes, you have
3860 your facts straight," she said. It would cost $
10,
000 to use the clip of
3861 <em class=
"citetitle">The Simpsons
</em> in the corner of a shot in a documentary
3862 film about Wagner's Ring Cycle. And then, astonishingly, Herrera told Else,
3863 "And if you quote me, I'll turn you over to our attorneys." As an assistant
3864 to Herrera told Else later on, "They don't give a shit. They just want the
3867 Else didn't have the money to buy the right to replay what was playing on
3868 the television backstage at the San Francisco Opera. To reproduce this
3869 reality was beyond the documentary filmmaker's budget. At the very last
3870 minute before the film was to be released, Else digitally replaced the shot
3871 with a clip from another film that he had worked on,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Day
3872 After Trinity
</em>, from ten years before.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954548"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954554"></a>
3874 There's no doubt that someone, whether Matt Groening or Fox, owns the
3875 copyright to
<em class=
"citetitle">The Simpsons
</em>. That copyright is their
3876 property. To use that copyrighted material thus sometimes requires the
3877 permission of the copyright owner. If the use that Else wanted to make of
3878 the
<em class=
"citetitle">Simpsons
</em> copyright were one of the uses
3879 restricted by the law, then he would need to get the permission of the
3880 copyright owner before he could use the work in that way. And in a free
3881 market, it is the owner of the copyright who gets to set the price for any
3882 use that the law says the owner gets to control.
3884 For example, "public performance" is a use of
<em class=
"citetitle">The
3885 Simpsons
</em> that the copyright owner gets to control. If you take a
3886 selection of favorite episodes, rent a movie theater, and charge for tickets
3887 to come see "My Favorite
<em class=
"citetitle">Simpsons
</em>," then you need to
3888 get permission from the copyright owner. And the copyright owner (rightly,
3889 in my view) can charge whatever she wants
—$
10 or $
1,
000,
000. That's
3890 her right, as set by the law.
3892 But when lawyers hear this story about Jon Else and Fox, their first thought
3893 is "fair use."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2954602" href=
"#ftn.id2954602" class=
"footnote">112</a>]
</sup> Else's use of just
4.5
3894 seconds of an indirect shot of a
<em class=
"citetitle">Simpsons
</em> episode is
3895 clearly a fair use of
<em class=
"citetitle">The Simpsons
</em>—and fair use
3896 does not require the permission of anyone.
3900 So I asked Else why he didn't just rely upon "fair use." Here's his reply:
3901 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
3902 The
<em class=
"citetitle">Simpsons
</em> fiasco was for me a great lesson in the
3903 gulf between what lawyers find irrelevant in some abstract sense, and what
3904 is crushingly relevant in practice to those of us actually trying to make
3905 and broadcast documentaries. I never had any doubt that it was "clearly fair
3906 use" in an absolute legal sense. But I couldn't rely on the concept in any
3907 concrete way. Here's why:
3908 </p><div class=
"orderedlist"><ol class=
"orderedlist" type=
"1"><li class=
"listitem"><p>
3911 Before our films can be broadcast, the network requires that we buy Errors
3912 and Omissions insurance. The carriers require a detailed "visual cue sheet"
3913 listing the source and licensing status of each shot in the film. They take
3914 a dim view of "fair use," and a claim of "fair use" can grind the
3915 application process to a halt.
3916 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
3918 I probably never should have asked Matt Groening in the first place. But I
3919 knew (at least from folklore) that Fox had a history of tracking down and
3920 stopping unlicensed
<em class=
"citetitle">Simpsons
</em> usage, just as George
3921 Lucas had a very high profile litigating
<em class=
"citetitle">Star Wars
</em>
3922 usage. So I decided to play by the book, thinking that we would be granted
3923 free or cheap license to four seconds of
<em class=
"citetitle">Simpsons
</em>. As
3924 a documentary producer working to exhaustion on a shoestring, the last thing
3925 I wanted was to risk legal trouble, even nuisance legal trouble, and even to
3926 defend a principle.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954691"></a>
3927 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
3931 I did, in fact, speak with one of your colleagues at Stanford Law School
3932 . . . who confirmed that it was fair use. He also confirmed that Fox would
3933 "depose and litigate you to within an inch of your life," regardless of the
3934 merits of my claim. He made clear that it would boil down to who had the
3935 bigger legal department and the deeper pockets, me or them.
3937 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
3940 The question of fair use usually comes up at the end of the project, when we
3941 are up against a release deadline and out of money.
3942 </p></li></ol></div></blockquote></div><p>
3943 In theory, fair use means you need no permission. The theory therefore
3944 supports free culture and insulates against a permission culture. But in
3945 practice, fair use functions very differently. The fuzzy lines of the law,
3946 tied to the extraordinary liability if lines are crossed, means that the
3947 effective fair use for many types of creators is slight. The law has the
3948 right aim; practice has defeated the aim.
3950 This practice shows just how far the law has come from its
3951 eighteenth-century roots. The law was born as a shield to protect
3952 publishers' profits against the unfair competition of a pirate. It has
3953 matured into a sword that interferes with any use, transformative or not.
3954 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2954602" href=
"#id2954602" class=
"para">112</a>]
</sup>
3957 For an excellent argument that such use is "fair use," but that lawyers
3958 don't permit recognition that it is "fair use," see Richard A. Posner with
3959 William F. Patry, "Fair Use and Statutory Reform in the Wake of
3960 <em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em>" (draft on file with author), University of
3961 Chicago Law School, 5 August 2003.
3962 </p></div></div></div><div class="chapter
" title="Kapittel
9. Kapittel åtte: Omformere
"><div class="titlepage
"><div><div><h2 class="title
"><a name="transformers
"></a>Kapittel 9. Kapittel åtte: Omformere</h2></div></div></div><a class="indexterm
" name="id2954755
"></a><a class="indexterm
" name="id2954762
"></a><p>
3963 In 1993, Alex Alben was a lawyer working at Starwave, Inc. Starwave was an
3964 innovative company founded by Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen to develop
3965 digital entertainment. Long before the Internet became popular, Starwave
3966 began investing in new technology for delivering entertainment in
3967 anticipation of the power of networks.
3968 </p><a class="indexterm
" name="id2954777
"></a><p>
3969 Alben had a special interest in new technology. He was intrigued by the
3970 emerging market for CD-ROM technology—not to distribute film, but to
3971 do things with film that otherwise would be very difficult. In 1993, he
3972 launched an initiative to develop a product to build retrospectives on the
3973 work of particular actors. The first actor chosen was Clint Eastwood. The
3974 idea was to showcase all of the work of Eastwood, with clips from his films
3975 and interviews with figures important to his career.
3976 </p><a class="indexterm
" name="id2954785
"></a><p>
3977 At that time, Eastwood had made more than fifty films, as an actor and as a
3978 director. Alben began with a series of interviews with Eastwood, asking him
3979 about his career. Because Starwave produced those interviews, it was free to
3980 include them on the CD.
3984 That alone would not have made a very interesting product, so Starwave
3985 wanted to add content from the movies in Eastwood's career: posters,
3986 scripts, and other material relating to the films Eastwood made. Most of his
3987 career was spent at Warner Brothers, and so it was relatively easy to get
3988 permission for that content.
3989 </p><a class="indexterm
" name="id2954819
"></a><p>
3990 Then Alben and his team decided to include actual film clips. "Our goal was
3991 that we were going to have a clip from every one of Eastwood's films," Alben
3992 told me. It was here that the problem arose. "No one had ever really done
3993 this before," Alben explained. "No one had ever tried to do this in the
3994 context of an artistic look at an actor's career."
3995 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954835"></a><p>
3996 Alben brought the idea to Michael Slade, the CEO of Starwave. Slade asked,
3997 "Well, what will it take?"
3998 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954846"></a><p>
3999 Alben replied, "Well, we're going to have to clear rights from everyone who
4000 appears in these films, and the music and everything else that we want to
4001 use in these film clips." Slade said, "Great! Go for it."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2954858" href=
"#ftn.id2954858" class=
"footnote">113</a>]
</sup>
4003 The problem was that neither Alben nor Slade had any idea what clearing
4004 those rights would mean. Every actor in each of the films could have a claim
4005 to royalties for the reuse of that film. But CD- ROMs had not been specified
4006 in the contracts for the actors, so there was no clear way to know just what
4009 I asked Alben how he dealt with the problem. With an obvious pride in his
4010 resourcefulness that obscured the obvious bizarreness of his tale, Alben
4011 recounted just what they did:
4012 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
4013 So we very mechanically went about looking up the film clips. We made some
4014 artistic decisions about what film clips to include
—of course we were
4015 going to use the "Make my day" clip from
<em class=
"citetitle">Dirty
4016 Harry
</em>. But you then need to get the guy on the ground who's
4017 wiggling under the gun and you need to get his permission. And then you
4018 have to decide what you are going to pay him.
4022 We decided that it would be fair if we offered them the dayplayer rate for
4023 the right to reuse that performance. We're talking about a clip of less than
4024 a minute, but to reuse that performance in the CD-ROM the rate at the time
4025 was about $
600. So we had to identify the people
—some of them were
4026 hard to identify because in Eastwood movies you can't tell who's the guy
4027 crashing through the glass
—is it the actor or is it the stuntman? And
4028 then we just, we put together a team, my assistant and some others, and we
4029 just started calling people.
4030 </p></blockquote></div><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954919"></a><p>
4031 Some actors were glad to help
—Donald Sutherland, for example, followed
4032 up himself to be sure that the rights had been cleared. Others were
4033 dumbfounded at their good fortune. Alben would ask, "Hey, can I pay you $
600
4034 or maybe if you were in two films, you know, $
1,
200?" And they would say,
4035 "Are you for real? Hey, I'd love to get $
1,
200." And some of course were a
4036 bit difficult (estranged ex-wives, in particular). But eventually, Alben and
4037 his team had cleared the rights to this retrospective CD-ROM on Clint
4040 It was one
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>year
</em></span> later
—"and even then we weren't
4041 sure whether we were totally in the clear."
4042 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954956"></a><p>
4043 Alben is proud of his work. The project was the first of its kind and the
4044 only time he knew of that a team had undertaken such a massive project for
4045 the purpose of releasing a retrospective.
4046 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
4047 Everyone thought it would be too hard. Everyone just threw up their hands
4048 and said, "Oh, my gosh, a film, it's so many copyrights, there's the music,
4049 there's the screenplay, there's the director, there's the actors." But we
4050 just broke it down. We just put it into its constituent parts and said,
4051 "Okay, there's this many actors, this many directors, . . . this many
4052 musicians," and we just went at it very systematically and cleared the
4054 </p></blockquote></div><p>
4058 And no doubt, the product itself was exceptionally good. Eastwood loved it,
4059 and it sold very well.
4060 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954990"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954997"></a><p>
4061 But I pressed Alben about how weird it seems that it would have to take a
4062 year's work simply to clear rights. No doubt Alben had done this
4063 efficiently, but as Peter Drucker has famously quipped, "There is nothing so
4064 useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at
4065 all."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2955010" href=
"#ftn.id2955010" class=
"footnote">114</a>]
</sup> Did it make sense, I asked Alben,
4066 that this is the way a new work has to be made?
4068 For, as he acknowledged, "very few . . . have the time and resources, and
4069 the will to do this," and thus, very few such works would ever be made. Does
4070 it make sense, I asked him, from the standpoint of what anybody really
4071 thought they were ever giving rights for originally, that you would have to
4072 go clear rights for these kinds of clips?
4073 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
4074 I don't think so. When an actor renders a performance in a movie, he or she
4075 gets paid very well. . . . And then when
30 seconds of that performance is
4076 used in a new product that is a retrospective of somebody's career, I don't
4077 think that that person . . . should be compensated for that.
4078 </p></blockquote></div><p>
4079 Or at least, is this
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>how
</em></span> the artist should be
4080 compensated? Would it make sense, I asked, for there to be some kind of
4081 statutory license that someone could pay and be free to make derivative use
4082 of clips like this? Did it really make sense that a follow-on creator would
4083 have to track down every artist, actor, director, musician, and get explicit
4084 permission from each? Wouldn't a lot more be created if the legal part of
4085 the creative process could be made to be more clean?
4086 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
4088 Absolutely. I think that if there were some fair-licensing
4089 mechanism
—where you weren't subject to hold-ups and you weren't
4090 subject to estranged former spouses
—you'd see a lot more of this work,
4091 because it wouldn't be so daunting to try to put together a retrospective of
4092 someone's career and meaningfully illustrate it with lots of media from that
4093 person's career. You'd build in a cost as the producer of one of these
4094 things. You'd build in a cost of paying X dollars to the talent that
4095 performed. But it would be a known cost. That's the thing that trips
4096 everybody up and makes this kind of product hard to get off the ground. If
4097 you knew I have a hundred minutes of film in this product and it's going to
4098 cost me X, then you build your budget around it, and you can get investments
4099 and everything else that you need to produce it. But if you say, "Oh, I want
4100 a hundred minutes of something and I have no idea what it's going to cost
4101 me, and a certain number of people are going to hold me up for money," then
4102 it becomes difficult to put one of these things together.
4103 </p></blockquote></div><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955091"></a><p>
4104 Alben worked for a big company. His company was backed by some of the
4105 richest investors in the world. He therefore had authority and access that
4106 the average Web designer would not have. So if it took him a year, how long
4107 would it take someone else? And how much creativity is never made just
4108 because the costs of clearing the rights are so high? These costs are the
4109 burdens of a kind of regulation. Put on a Republican hat for a moment, and
4110 get angry for a bit. The government defines the scope of these rights, and
4111 the scope defined determines how much it's going to cost to negotiate
4112 them. (Remember the idea that land runs to the heavens, and imagine the
4113 pilot purchasing flythrough rights as he negotiates to fly from Los Angeles
4114 to San Francisco.) These rights might well have once made sense; but as
4115 circumstances change, they make no sense at all. Or at least, a
4116 well-trained, regulationminimizing Republican should look at the rights and
4117 ask, "Does this still make sense?"
4120 I've seen the flash of recognition when people get this point, but only a
4121 few times. The first was at a conference of federal judges in California.
4122 The judges were gathered to discuss the emerging topic of cyber-law. I was
4123 asked to be on the panel. Harvey Saferstein, a well-respected lawyer from an
4124 L.A. firm, introduced the panel with a video that he and a friend, Robert
4125 Fairbank, had produced.
4127 Videoen var en glimrende sammenstilling av filmer fra hver periode i det
4128 tjuende århundret, rammet inn rundt idéen om en episode i TV-serien
4129 <em class=
"citetitle">60 Minutes
</em>. Utførelsen var perfekt, ned til seksti
4130 minutter stoppeklokken. Dommerne elsket enhver minutt av den.
4131 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955144"></a><p>
4132 Da lysene kom på, kikket jeg over til min medpaneldeltager, David Nimmer,
4133 kanskje den ledende opphavsrettakademiker og utøver i nasjonen. Han hadde en
4134 forbauset uttrykk i ansiktet sitt, mens han tittet ut over rommet med over
4135 250 godt underholdte dommere. Med en en illevarslende tone, begynte han sin
4136 tale med et spørsmål: "Vet dere hvor mange føderale lover som nettopp brutt
4138 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955164"></a><p>
4139 For of course, the two brilliantly talented creators who made this film
4140 hadn't done what Alben did. They hadn't spent a year clearing the rights to
4141 these clips; technically, what they had done violated the law. Of course,
4142 it wasn't as if they or anyone were going to be prosecuted for this
4143 violation (the presence of
250 judges and a gaggle of federal marshals
4144 notwithstanding). But Nimmer was making an important point: A year before
4145 anyone would have heard of the word Napster, and two years before another
4146 member of our panel, David Boies, would defend Napster before the Ninth
4147 Circuit Court of Appeals, Nimmer was trying to get the judges to see that
4148 the law would not be friendly to the capacities that this technology would
4149 enable. Technology means you can now do amazing things easily; but you
4150 couldn't easily do them legally.
4152 We live in a "cut and paste" culture enabled by technology. Anyone building
4153 a presentation knows the extraordinary freedom that the cut and paste
4154 architecture of the Internet created
—in a second you can find just
4155 about any image you want; in another second, you can have it planted in your
4158 But presentations are just a tiny beginning. Using the Internet and its
4159 archives, musicians are able to string together mixes of sound never before
4160 imagined; filmmakers are able to build movies out of clips on computers
4161 around the world. An extraordinary site in Sweden takes images of
4162 politicians and blends them with music to create biting political
4163 commentary. A site called Camp Chaos has produced some of the most biting
4164 criticism of the record industry that there is through the mixing of Flash!
4165 and music.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955192"></a>
4167 All of these creations are technically illegal. Even if the creators wanted
4168 to be "legal," the cost of complying with the law is impossibly
4169 high. Therefore, for the law-abiding sorts, a wealth of creativity is never
4170 made. And for that part that is made, if it doesn't follow the clearance
4171 rules, it doesn't get released.
4173 To some, these stories suggest a solution: Let's alter the mix of rights so
4174 that people are free to build upon our culture. Free to add or mix as they
4175 see fit. We could even make this change without necessarily requiring that
4176 the "free" use be free as in "free beer." Instead, the system could simply
4177 make it easy for follow-on creators to compensate artists without requiring
4178 an army of lawyers to come along: a rule, for example, that says "the
4179 royalty owed the copyright owner of an unregistered work for the derivative
4180 reuse of his work will be a flat
1 percent of net revenues, to be held in
4181 escrow for the copyright owner." Under this rule, the copyright owner could
4182 benefit from some royalty, but he would not have the benefit of a full
4183 property right (meaning the right to name his own price) unless he registers
4186 Who could possibly object to this? And what reason would there be for
4187 objecting? We're talking about work that is not now being made; which if
4188 made, under this plan, would produce new income for artists. What reason
4189 would anyone have to oppose it?
4192 In February
2003, DreamWorks studios announced an agreement with Mike Myers,
4193 the comic genius of
<em class=
"citetitle">Saturday Night Live
</em> and Austin
4194 Powers. According to the announcement, Myers and Dream-Works would work
4195 together to form a "unique filmmaking pact." Under the agreement, DreamWorks
4196 "will acquire the rights to existing motion picture hits and classics, write
4197 new storylines and
—with the use of stateof-the-art digital
4198 technology
—insert Myers and other actors into the film, thereby
4199 creating an entirely new piece of entertainment."
4201 The announcement called this "film sampling." As Myers explained, "Film
4202 Sampling is an exciting way to put an original spin on existing films and
4203 allow audiences to see old movies in a new light. Rap artists have been
4204 doing this for years with music and now we are able to take that same
4205 concept and apply it to film." Steven Spielberg is quoted as saying, "If
4206 anyone can create a way to bring old films to new audiences, it is Mike."
4208 Spielberg is right. Film sampling by Myers will be brilliant. But if you
4209 don't think about it, you might miss the truly astonishing point about this
4210 announcement. As the vast majority of our film heritage remains under
4211 copyright, the real meaning of the DreamWorks announcement is just this: It
4212 is Mike Myers and only Mike Myers who is free to sample. Any general freedom
4213 to build upon the film archive of our culture, a freedom in other contexts
4214 presumed for us all, is now a privilege reserved for the funny and
4215 famous
—and presumably rich.
4217 This privilege becomes reserved for two sorts of reasons. The first
4218 continues the story of the last chapter: the vagueness of "fair use." Much
4219 of "sampling" should be considered "fair use." But few would rely upon so
4220 weak a doctrine to create. That leads to the second reason that the
4221 privilege is reserved for the few: The costs of negotiating the legal rights
4222 for the creative reuse of content are astronomically high. These costs
4223 mirror the costs with fair use: You either pay a lawyer to defend your fair
4224 use rights or pay a lawyer to track down permissions so you don't have to
4225 rely upon fair use rights. Either way, the creative process is a process of
4226 paying lawyers
—again a privilege, or perhaps a curse, reserved for the
4228 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2954858" href=
"#id2954858" class=
"para">113</a>]
</sup>
4230 Technically, the rights that Alben had to clear were mainly those of
4231 publicity
—rights an artist has to control the commercial exploitation
4232 of his image. But these rights, too, burden "Rip, Mix, Burn" creativity, as
4233 this chapter evinces.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2954787"></a>
4234 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2955010" href=
"#id2955010" class=
"para">114</a>]
</sup>
4237 U.S. Department of Commerce Office of Acquisition Management,
4238 <em class=
"citetitle">Seven Steps to Performance-Based Services
4239 Acquisition
</em>, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
22</a>.
4240 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 10. Kapittel ni: Samlere"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"collectors"></a>Kapittel
10. Kapittel ni: Samlere
</h2></div></div></div><p>
4241 In April
1996, millions of "bots"
—computer codes designed to "spider,"
4242 or automatically search the Internet and copy content
—began running
4243 across the Net. Page by page, these bots copied Internet-based information
4244 onto a small set of computers located in a basement in San Francisco's
4245 Presidio. Once the bots finished the whole of the Internet, they started
4246 again. Over and over again, once every two months, these bits of code took
4247 copies of the Internet and stored them.
4249 By October
2001, the bots had collected more than five years of copies. And
4250 at a small announcement in Berkeley, California, the archive that these
4251 copies created, the Internet Archive, was opened to the world. Using a
4252 technology called "the Way Back Machine," you could enter a Web page, and
4253 see all of its copies going back to
1996, as well as when those pages
4256 This is the thing about the Internet that Orwell would have appreciated. In
4257 the dystopia described in
<em class=
"citetitle">1984</em>, old newspapers were
4258 constantly updated to assure that the current view of the world, approved of
4259 by the government, was not contradicted by previous news reports.
4263 Thousands of workers constantly reedited the past, meaning there was no way
4264 ever to know whether the story you were reading today was the story that was
4265 printed on the date published on the paper.
4267 It's the same with the Internet. If you go to a Web page today, there's no
4268 way for you to know whether the content you are reading is the same as the
4269 content you read before. The page may seem the same, but the content could
4270 easily be different. The Internet is Orwell's library
—constantly
4271 updated, without any reliable memory.
4273 Until the Way Back Machine, at least. With the Way Back Machine, and the
4274 Internet Archive underlying it, you can see what the Internet was. You have
4275 the power to see what you remember. More importantly, perhaps, you also have
4276 the power to find what you don't remember and what others might prefer you
4277 forget.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2955363" href=
"#ftn.id2955363" class=
"footnote">115</a>]
</sup>
4279 We take it for granted that we can go back to see what we remember
4280 reading. Think about newspapers. If you wanted to study the reaction of your
4281 hometown newspaper to the race riots in Watts in
1965, or to Bull Connor's
4282 water cannon in
1963, you could go to your public library and look at the
4283 newspapers. Those papers probably exist on microfiche. If you're lucky, they
4284 exist in paper, too. Either way, you are free, using a library, to go back
4285 and remember
—not just what it is convenient to remember, but remember
4286 something close to the truth.
4288 It is said that those who fail to remember history are doomed to repeat
4289 it. That's not quite correct. We
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>all
</em></span> forget
4290 history. The key is whether we have a way to go back to rediscover what we
4291 forget. More directly, the key is whether an objective past can keep us
4292 honest. Libraries help do that, by collecting content and keeping it, for
4293 schoolchildren, for researchers, for grandma. A free society presumes this
4297 The Internet was an exception to this presumption. Until the Internet
4298 Archive, there was no way to go back. The Internet was the quintessentially
4299 transitory medium. And yet, as it becomes more important in forming and
4300 reforming society, it becomes more and more important to maintain in some
4301 historical form. It's just bizarre to think that we have scads of archives
4302 of newspapers from tiny towns around the world, yet there is but one copy of
4303 the Internet
—the one kept by the Internet Archive.
4305 Brewster Kahle is the founder of the Internet Archive. He was a very
4306 successful Internet entrepreneur after he was a successful computer
4307 researcher. In the
1990s, Kahle decided he had had enough business
4308 success. It was time to become a different kind of success. So he launched
4309 a series of projects designed to archive human knowledge. The Internet
4310 Archive was just the first of the projects of this Andrew Carnegie of the
4311 Internet. By December of
2002, the archive had over
10 billion pages, and it
4312 was growing at about a billion pages a month.
4314 The Way Back Machine is the largest archive of human knowledge in human
4315 history. At the end of
2002, it held "two hundred and thirty terabytes of
4316 material"
—and was "ten times larger than the Library of Congress." And
4317 this was just the first of the archives that Kahle set out to build. In
4318 addition to the Internet Archive, Kahle has been constructing the Television
4319 Archive. Television, it turns out, is even more ephemeral than the
4320 Internet. While much of twentieth-century culture was constructed through
4321 television, only a tiny proportion of that culture is available for anyone
4322 to see today. Three hours of news are recorded each evening by Vanderbilt
4323 University
—thanks to a specific exemption in the copyright law. That
4324 content is indexed, and is available to scholars for a very low fee. "But
4325 other than that, [television] is almost unavailable," Kahle told me. "If you
4326 were Barbara Walters you could get access to [the archives], but if you are
4327 just a graduate student?" As Kahle put it,
4328 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
4330 Do you remember when Dan Quayle was interacting with Murphy Brown? Remember
4331 that back and forth surreal experience of a politician interacting with a
4332 fictional television character? If you were a graduate student wanting to
4333 study that, and you wanted to get those original back and forth exchanges
4334 between the two, the
<em class=
"citetitle">60 Minutes
</em> episode that came out
4335 after it . . . it would be almost impossible. . . . Those materials are
4336 almost unfindable. . . .
4337 </p></blockquote></div><p>
4338 Why is that? Why is it that the part of our culture that is recorded in
4339 newspapers remains perpetually accessible, while the part that is recorded
4340 on videotape is not? How is it that we've created a world where researchers
4341 trying to understand the effect of media on nineteenthcentury America will
4342 have an easier time than researchers trying to understand the effect of
4343 media on twentieth-century America?
4345 In part, this is because of the law. Early in American copyright law,
4346 copyright owners were required to deposit copies of their work in
4347 libraries. These copies were intended both to facilitate the spread of
4348 knowledge and to assure that a copy of the work would be around once the
4349 copyright expired, so that others might access and copy the work.
4351 These rules applied to film as well. But in
1915, the Library of Congress
4352 made an exception for film. Film could be copyrighted so long as such
4353 deposits were made. But the filmmaker was then allowed to borrow back the
4354 deposits
—for an unlimited time at no cost. In
1915 alone, there were
4355 more than
5,
475 films deposited and "borrowed back." Thus, when the
4356 copyrights to films expire, there is no copy held by any library. The copy
4357 exists
—if it exists at all
—in the library archive of the film
4358 company.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2955428" href=
"#ftn.id2955428" class=
"footnote">116</a>]
</sup>
4360 The same is generally true about television. Television broadcasts were
4361 originally not copyrighted
—there was no way to capture the broadcasts,
4362 so there was no fear of "theft." But as technology enabled capturing,
4363 broadcasters relied increasingly upon the law. The law required they make a
4364 copy of each broadcast for the work to be "copyrighted." But those copies
4365 were simply kept by the broadcasters. No library had any right to them; the
4366 government didn't demand them. The content of this part of American culture
4367 is practically invisible to anyone who would look.
4370 Kahle was eager to correct this. Before September
11,
2001, he and his
4371 allies had started capturing television. They selected twenty stations from
4372 around the world and hit the Record button. After September
11, Kahle,
4373 working with dozens of others, selected twenty stations from around the
4374 world and, beginning October
11,
2001, made their coverage during the week
4375 of September
11 available free on-line. Anyone could see how news reports
4376 from around the world covered the events of that day.
4378 Kahle had the same idea with film. Working with Rick Prelinger, whose
4379 archive of film includes close to
45,
000 "ephemeral films" (meaning films
4380 other than Hollywood movies, films that were never copyrighted), Kahle
4381 established the Movie Archive. Prelinger let Kahle digitize
1,
300 films in
4382 this archive and post those films on the Internet to be downloaded for
4383 free. Prelinger's is a for-profit company. It sells copies of these films as
4384 stock footage. What he has discovered is that after he made a significant
4385 chunk available for free, his stock footage sales went up
4386 dramatically. People could easily find the material they wanted to use. Some
4387 downloaded that material and made films on their own. Others purchased
4388 copies to enable other films to be made. Either way, the archive enabled
4389 access to this important part of our culture. Want to see a copy of the
4390 "Duck and Cover" film that instructed children how to save themselves in the
4391 middle of nuclear attack? Go to archive.org, and you can download the film
4392 in a few minutes
—for free.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955535"></a>
4394 Here again, Kahle is providing access to a part of our culture that we
4395 otherwise could not get easily, if at all. It is yet another part of what
4396 defines the twentieth century that we have lost to history. The law doesn't
4397 require these copies to be kept by anyone, or to be deposited in an archive
4398 by anyone. Therefore, there is no simple way to find them.
4400 The key here is access, not price. Kahle wants to enable free access to this
4401 content, but he also wants to enable others to sell access to it. His aim is
4402 to ensure competition in access to this important part of our culture. Not
4403 during the commercial life of a bit of creative property, but during a
4404 second life that all creative property has
—a noncommercial life.
4407 For here is an idea that we should more clearly recognize. Every bit of
4408 creative property goes through different "lives." In its first life, if the
4409 creator is lucky, the content is sold. In such cases the commercial market
4410 is successful for the creator. The vast majority of creative property
4411 doesn't enjoy such success, but some clearly does. For that content,
4412 commercial life is extremely important. Without this commercial market,
4413 there would be, many argue, much less creativity.
4415 After the commercial life of creative property has ended, our tradition has
4416 always supported a second life as well. A newspaper delivers the news every
4417 day to the doorsteps of America. The very next day, it is used to wrap fish
4418 or to fill boxes with fragile gifts or to build an archive of knowledge
4419 about our history. In this second life, the content can continue to inform
4420 even if that information is no longer sold.
4422 The same has always been true about books. A book goes out of print very
4423 quickly (the average today is after about a year
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2955635" href=
"#ftn.id2955635" class=
"footnote">117</a>]
</sup>). After it is out of print, it can be sold in used book stores
4424 without the copyright owner getting anything and stored in libraries, where
4425 many get to read the book, also for free. Used book stores and libraries are
4426 thus the second life of a book. That second life is extremely important to
4427 the spread and stability of culture.
4429 Yet increasingly, any assumption about a stable second life for creative
4430 property does not hold true with the most important components of popular
4431 culture in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. For
4432 these
—television, movies, music, radio, the Internet
—there is no
4433 guarantee of a second life. For these sorts of culture, it is as if we've
4434 replaced libraries with Barnes
& Noble superstores. With this culture,
4435 what's accessible is nothing but what a certain limited market demands.
4436 Beyond that, culture disappears.
4439 For most of the twentieth century, it was economics that made this so. It
4440 would have been insanely expensive to collect and make accessible all
4441 television and film and music: The cost of analog copies is extraordinarily
4442 high. So even though the law in principle would have restricted the ability
4443 of a Brewster Kahle to copy culture generally, the real restriction was
4444 economics. The market made it impossibly difficult to do anything about this
4445 ephemeral culture; the law had little practical effect.
4447 Perhaps the single most important feature of the digital revolution is that
4448 for the first time since the Library of Alexandria, it is feasible to
4449 imagine constructing archives that hold all culture produced or distributed
4450 publicly. Technology makes it possible to imagine an archive of all books
4451 published, and increasingly makes it possible to imagine an archive of all
4452 moving images and sound.
4454 The scale of this potential archive is something we've never imagined
4455 before. The Brewster Kahles of our history have dreamed about it; but we are
4456 for the first time at a point where that dream is possible. As Kahle
4458 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
4459 It looks like there's about two to three million recordings of music.
4460 Ever. There are about a hundred thousand theatrical releases of movies,
4461 . . . and about one to two million movies [distributed] during the twentieth
4462 century. There are about twenty-six million different titles of books. All
4463 of these would fit on computers that would fit in this room and be able to
4464 be afforded by a small company. So we're at a turning point in our
4465 history. Universal access is the goal. And the opportunity of leading a
4466 different life, based on this, is . . . thrilling. It could be one of the
4467 things humankind would be most proud of. Up there with the Library of
4468 Alexandria, putting a man on the moon, and the invention of the printing
4470 </p></blockquote></div><p>
4472 Kahle is not the only librarian. The Internet Archive is not the only
4473 archive. But Kahle and the Internet Archive suggest what the future of
4474 libraries or archives could be.
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>When
</em></span> the commercial
4475 life of creative property ends, I don't know. But it does. And whenever it
4476 does, Kahle and his archive hint at a world where this knowledge, and
4477 culture, remains perpetually available. Some will draw upon it to understand
4478 it; some to criticize it. Some will use it, as Walt Disney did, to re-create
4479 the past for the future. These technologies promise something that had
4480 become unimaginable for much of our past
—a future
4481 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>for
</em></span> our past. The technology of digital arts could make
4482 the dream of the Library of Alexandria real again.
4484 Technologists have thus removed the economic costs of building such an
4485 archive. But lawyers' costs remain. For as much as we might like to call
4486 these "archives," as warm as the idea of a "library" might seem, the
4487 "content" that is collected in these digital spaces is also someone's
4488 "property." And the law of property restricts the freedoms that Kahle and
4489 others would exercise.
4490 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2955363" href=
"#id2955363" class=
"para">115</a>]
</sup>
4493 The temptations remain, however. Brewster Kahle reports that the White House
4494 changes its own press releases without notice. A May
13,
2003, press release
4495 stated, "Combat Operations in Iraq Have Ended." That was later changed,
4496 without notice, to "Major Combat Operations in Iraq Have Ended." E-mail from
4497 Brewster Kahle,
1 December
2003.
4498 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2955428" href=
"#id2955428" class=
"para">116</a>]
</sup>
4501 Doug Herrick, "Toward a National Film Collection: Motion Pictures at the
4502 Library of Congress,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Film Library Quarterly
</em> 13
4503 nos.
2–3 (
1980):
5; Anthony Slide,
<em class=
"citetitle">Nitrate Won't Wait: A
4504 History of Film Preservation in the United States
</em> ( Jefferson,
4505 N.C.: McFarland
& Co.,
1992),
36.
4506 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2955635" href=
"#id2955635" class=
"para">117</a>]
</sup>
4509 Dave Barns, "Fledgling Career in Antique Books: Woodstock Landlord, Bar
4510 Owner Starts a New Chapter by Adopting Business,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Chicago
4511 Tribune
</em>,
5 September
1997, at Metro Lake
1L. Of books published
4512 between
1927 and
1946, only
2.2 percent were in print in
2002. R. Anthony
4513 Reese, "The First Sale Doctrine in the Era of Digital Networks,"
4514 <em class=
"citetitle">Boston College Law Review
</em> 44 (
2003):
593 n.
51.
4515 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title='Kapittel
11. Kapittel ti:
"Eiendom"'
><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"property-i"></a>Kapittel
11. Kapittel ti: "Eiendom"
</h2></div></div></div><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#hollywood">Hvorfor Hollywood har rett
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#beginnings">Opphav
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawduration">Loven: Varighet
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawscope">Loven: Virkeområde
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawreach">Lov og arkitektur: Rekkevidde
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#lawforce">Arkitektur og lov: Makt
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#marketconcentration">Marked: Konsentrasjon
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#together">Sammen
</a></span></dt></dl></div><p>
4516 Jack Valenti has been the president of the Motion Picture Association of
4517 America since
1966. He first came to Washington, D.C., with Lyndon Johnson's
4518 administration
—literally. The famous picture of Johnson's swearing-in
4519 on Air Force One after the assassination of President Kennedy has Valenti in
4520 the background. In his almost forty years of running the MPAA, Valenti has
4521 established himself as perhaps the most prominent and effective lobbyist in
4522 Washington.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955744"></a>
4524 The MPAA is the American branch of the international Motion Picture
4525 Association. It was formed in
1922 as a trade association whose goal was to
4526 defend American movies against increasing domestic criticism. The
4527 organization now represents not only filmmakers but producers and
4528 distributors of entertainment for television, video, and cable. Its board is
4529 made up of the chairmen and presidents of the seven major producers and
4530 distributors of motion picture and television programs in the United States:
4531 Walt Disney, Sony Pictures Entertainment, MGM, Paramount Pictures, Twentieth
4532 Century Fox, Universal Studios, and Warner Brothers.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955801"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955807"></a>
4533 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955813"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955819"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955826"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955832"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955838"></a>
4537 Valenti is only the third president of the MPAA. No president before him has
4538 had as much influence over that organization, or over Washington. As a
4539 Texan, Valenti has mastered the single most important political skill of a
4540 Southerner
—the ability to appear simple and slow while hiding a
4541 lightning-fast intellect. To this day, Valenti plays the simple, humble
4542 man. But this Harvard MBA, and author of four books, who finished high
4543 school at the age of fifteen and flew more than fifty combat missions in
4544 World War II, is no Mr. Smith. When Valenti went to Washington, he mastered
4545 the city in a quintessentially Washingtonian way.
4547 In defending artistic liberty and the freedom of speech that our culture
4548 depends upon, the MPAA has done important good. In crafting the MPAA rating
4549 system, it has probably avoided a great deal of speech-regulating harm. But
4550 there is an aspect to the organization's mission that is both the most
4551 radical and the most important. This is the organization's effort,
4552 epitomized in Valenti's every act, to redefine the meaning of "creative
4555 In
1982, Valenti's testimony to Congress captured the strategy perfectly:
4556 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
4557 No matter the lengthy arguments made, no matter the charges and the
4558 counter-charges, no matter the tumult and the shouting, reasonable men and
4559 women will keep returning to the fundamental issue, the central theme which
4560 animates this entire debate:
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>Creative property owners must be
4561 accorded the same rights and protection resident in all other property
4562 owners in the nation
</em></span>. That is the issue. That is the
4563 question. And that is the rostrum on which this entire hearing and the
4564 debates to follow must rest.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2955894" href=
"#ftn.id2955894" class=
"footnote">118</a>]
</sup>
4565 </p></blockquote></div><p>
4567 The strategy of this rhetoric, like the strategy of most of Valenti's
4568 rhetoric, is brilliant and simple and brilliant because simple. The "central
4569 theme" to which "reasonable men and women" will return is this: "Creative
4570 property owners must be accorded the same rights and protections resident in
4571 all other property owners in the nation." There are no second-class
4572 citizens, Valenti might have continued. There should be no second-class
4575 This claim has an obvious and powerful intuitive pull. It is stated with
4576 such clarity as to make the idea as obvious as the notion that we use
4577 elections to pick presidents. But in fact, there is no more extreme a claim
4578 made by
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>anyone
</em></span> who is serious in this debate than this
4579 claim of Valenti's. Jack Valenti, however sweet and however brilliant, is
4580 perhaps the nation's foremost extremist when it comes to the nature and
4581 scope of "creative property." His views have
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>no
</em></span>
4582 reasonable connection to our actual legal tradition, even if the subtle pull
4583 of his Texan charm has slowly redefined that tradition, at least in
4586 While "creative property" is certainly "property" in a nerdy and precise
4587 sense that lawyers are trained to understand,
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2955946" href=
"#ftn.id2955946" class=
"footnote">119</a>]
</sup> it has never been the case, nor should it be, that "creative
4588 property owners" have been "accorded the same rights and protection resident
4589 in all other property owners." Indeed, if creative property owners were
4590 given the same rights as all other property owners, that would effect a
4591 radical, and radically undesirable, change in our tradition.
4593 Valenti knows this. But he speaks for an industry that cares squat for our
4594 tradition and the values it represents. He speaks for an industry that is
4595 instead fighting to restore the tradition that the British overturned in
4596 1710. In the world that Valenti's changes would create, a powerful few would
4597 exercise powerful control over how our creative culture would develop.
4600 I have two purposes in this chapter. The first is to convince you that,
4601 historically, Valenti's claim is absolutely wrong. The second is to convince
4602 you that it would be terribly wrong for us to reject our history. We have
4603 always treated rights in creative property differently from the rights
4604 resident in all other property owners. They have never been the same. And
4605 they should never be the same, because, however counterintuitive this may
4606 seem, to make them the same would be to fundamentally weaken the opportunity
4607 for new creators to create. Creativity depends upon the owners of
4608 creativity having less than perfect control.
4610 Organizations such as the MPAA, whose board includes the most powerful of
4611 the old guard, have little interest, their rhetoric notwithstanding, in
4612 assuring that the new can displace them. No organization does. No person
4613 does. (Ask me about tenure, for example.) But what's good for the MPAA is
4614 not necessarily good for America. A society that defends the ideals of free
4615 culture must preserve precisely the opportunity for new creativity to
4616 threaten the old. To get just a hint that there is something fundamentally
4617 wrong in Valenti's argument, we need look no further than the United States
4618 Constitution itself.
4620 The framers of our Constitution loved "property." Indeed, so strongly did
4621 they love property that they built into the Constitution an important
4622 requirement. If the government takes your property
—if it condemns your
4623 house, or acquires a slice of land from your farm
—it is required,
4624 under the Fifth Amendment's "Takings Clause," to pay you "just compensation"
4625 for that taking. The Constitution thus guarantees that property is, in a
4626 certain sense, sacred. It cannot
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>ever
</em></span> be taken from the
4627 property owner unless the government pays for the privilege.
4630 Yet the very same Constitution speaks very differently about what Valenti
4631 calls "creative property." In the clause granting Congress the power to
4632 create "creative property," the Constitution
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>requires
</em></span>
4633 that after a "limited time," Congress take back the rights that it has
4634 granted and set the "creative property" free to the public domain. Yet when
4635 Congress does this, when the expiration of a copyright term "takes" your
4636 copyright and turns it over to the public domain, Congress does not have any
4637 obligation to pay "just compensation" for this "taking." Instead, the same
4638 Constitution that requires compensation for your land requires that you lose
4639 your "creative property" right without any compensation at all.
4641 The Constitution thus on its face states that these two forms of property
4642 are not to be accorded the same rights. They are plainly to be treated
4643 differently. Valenti is therefore not just asking for a change in our
4644 tradition when he argues that creative-property owners should be accorded
4645 the same rights as every other property-right owner. He is effectively
4646 arguing for a change in our Constitution itself.
4648 Arguing for a change in our Constitution is not necessarily wrong. There
4649 was much in our original Constitution that was plainly wrong. The
4650 Constitution of
1789 entrenched slavery; it left senators to be appointed
4651 rather than elected; it made it possible for the electoral college to
4652 produce a tie between the president and his own vice president (as it did in
4653 1800). The framers were no doubt extraordinary, but I would be the first to
4654 admit that they made big mistakes. We have since rejected some of those
4655 mistakes; no doubt there could be others that we should reject as well. So
4656 my argument is not simply that because Jefferson did it, we should, too.
4658 Instead, my argument is that because Jefferson did it, we should at least
4659 try to understand
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>why
</em></span>. Why did the framers, fanatical
4660 property types that they were, reject the claim that creative property be
4661 given the same rights as all other property? Why did they require that for
4662 creative property there must be a public domain?
4664 To answer this question, we need to get some perspective on the history of
4665 these "creative property" rights, and the control that they enabled. Once
4666 we see clearly how differently these rights have been defined, we will be in
4667 a better position to ask the question that should be at the core of this
4668 war: Not
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>whether
</em></span> creative property should be protected,
4669 but how. Not
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>whether
</em></span> we will enforce the rights the law
4670 gives to creative-property owners, but what the particular mix of rights
4671 ought to be. Not
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>whether
</em></span> artists should be paid, but
4672 whether institutions designed to assure that artists get paid need also
4673 control how culture develops.
4678 To answer these questions, we need a more general way to talk about how
4679 property is protected. More precisely, we need a more general way than the
4680 narrow language of the law allows. In
<em class=
"citetitle">Code and Other Laws of
4681 Cyberspace
</em>, I used a simple model to capture this more general
4682 perspective. For any particular right or regulation, this model asks how
4683 four different modalities of regulation interact to support or weaken the
4684 right or regulation. I represented it with this diagram:
4685 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1331"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.1. How four different modalities of regulation interact to support or weaken
4686 the right or regulation.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1331.png" alt=
"How four different modalities of regulation interact to support or weaken the right or regulation."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
4687 At the center of this picture is a regulated dot: the individual or group
4688 that is the target of regulation, or the holder of a right. (In each case
4689 throughout, we can describe this either as regulation or as a right. For
4690 simplicity's sake, I will speak only of regulations.) The ovals represent
4691 four ways in which the individual or group might be regulated
— either
4692 constrained or, alternatively, enabled. Law is the most obvious constraint
4693 (to lawyers, at least). It constrains by threatening punishments after the
4694 fact if the rules set in advance are violated. So if, for example, you
4695 willfully infringe Madonna's copyright by copying a song from her latest CD
4696 and posting it on the Web, you can be punished with a $
150,
000 fine. The
4697 fine is an ex post punishment for violating an ex ante rule. It is imposed
4698 by the state.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2955853"></a>
4700 Norms are a different kind of constraint. They, too, punish an individual
4701 for violating a rule. But the punishment of a norm is imposed by a
4702 community, not (or not only) by the state. There may be no law against
4703 spitting, but that doesn't mean you won't be punished if you spit on the
4704 ground while standing in line at a movie. The punishment might not be harsh,
4705 though depending upon the community, it could easily be more harsh than many
4706 of the punishments imposed by the state. The mark of the difference is not
4707 the severity of the rule, but the source of the enforcement.
4709 The market is a third type of constraint. Its constraint is effected through
4710 conditions: You can do X if you pay Y; you'll be paid M if you do N. These
4711 constraints are obviously not independent of law or norms
—it is
4712 property law that defines what must be bought if it is to be taken legally;
4713 it is norms that say what is appropriately sold. But given a set of norms,
4714 and a background of property and contract law, the market imposes a
4715 simultaneous constraint upon how an individual or group might behave.
4717 Finally, and for the moment, perhaps, most mysteriously,
4718 "architecture"
—the physical world as one finds it
—is a
4719 constraint on behavior. A fallen bridge might constrain your ability to get
4720 across a river. Railroad tracks might constrain the ability of a community
4721 to integrate its social life. As with the market, architecture does not
4722 effect its constraint through ex post punishments. Instead, also as with the
4723 market, architecture effects its constraint through simultaneous
4724 conditions. These conditions are imposed not by courts enforcing contracts,
4725 or by police punishing theft, but by nature, by "architecture." If a
4726 500-pound boulder blocks your way, it is the law of gravity that enforces
4727 this constraint. If a $
500 airplane ticket stands between you and a flight
4728 to New York, it is the market that enforces this constraint.
4733 So the first point about these four modalities of regulation is obvious:
4734 They interact. Restrictions imposed by one might be reinforced by
4735 another. Or restrictions imposed by one might be undermined by another.
4737 The second point follows directly: If we want to understand the effective
4738 freedom that anyone has at a given moment to do any particular thing, we
4739 have to consider how these four modalities interact. Whether or not there
4740 are other constraints (there may well be; my claim is not about
4741 comprehensiveness), these four are among the most significant, and any
4742 regulator (whether controlling or freeing) must consider how these four in
4743 particular interact.
4744 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxdrivespeed"></a><p>
4745 So, for example, consider the "freedom" to drive a car at a high speed. That
4746 freedom is in part restricted by laws: speed limits that say how fast you
4747 can drive in particular places at particular times. It is in part restricted
4748 by architecture: speed bumps, for example, slow most rational drivers;
4749 governors in buses, as another example, set the maximum rate at which the
4750 driver can drive. The freedom is in part restricted by the market: Fuel
4751 efficiency drops as speed increases, thus the price of gasoline indirectly
4752 constrains speed. And finally, the norms of a community may or may not
4753 constrain the freedom to speed. Drive at
50 mph by a school in your own
4754 neighborhood and you're likely to be punished by the neighbors. The same
4755 norm wouldn't be as effective in a different town, or at night.
4758 The final point about this simple model should also be fairly clear: While
4759 these four modalities are analytically independent, law has a special role
4760 in affecting the three.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2956280" href=
"#ftn.id2956280" class=
"footnote">120</a>]
</sup> The law, in
4761 other words, sometimes operates to increase or decrease the constraint of a
4762 particular modality. Thus, the law might be used to increase taxes on
4763 gasoline, so as to increase the incentives to drive more slowly. The law
4764 might be used to mandate more speed bumps, so as to increase the difficulty
4765 of driving rapidly. The law might be used to fund ads that stigmatize
4766 reckless driving. Or the law might be used to require that other laws be
4767 more strict
—a federal requirement that states decrease the speed
4768 limit, for example
—so as to decrease the attractiveness of fast
4770 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2956300"></a><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1361"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.2. Law has a special role in affecting the three.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1361.png" alt=
"Law has a special role in affecting the three."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
4771 These constraints can thus change, and they can be changed. To understand
4772 the effective protection of liberty or protection of property at any
4773 particular moment, we must track these changes over time. A restriction
4774 imposed by one modality might be erased by another. A freedom enabled by one
4775 modality might be displaced by another.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2956345" href=
"#ftn.id2956345" class=
"footnote">121</a>]
</sup>
4776 </p><div class=
"section" title=
"Hvorfor Hollywood har rett"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"hollywood"></a>Hvorfor Hollywood har rett
</h2></div></div></div><p>
4777 The most obvious point that this model reveals is just why, or just how,
4778 Hollywood is right. The copyright warriors have rallied Congress and the
4779 courts to defend copyright. This model helps us see why that rallying makes
4782 Let's say this is the picture of copyright's regulation before the Internet:
4783 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1371"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.3. Copyright's regulation before the Internet.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1331.png" alt=
"Copyright's regulation before the Internet."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
4786 There is balance between law, norms, market, and architecture. The law
4787 limits the ability to copy and share content, by imposing penalties on those
4788 who copy and share content. Those penalties are reinforced by technologies
4789 that make it hard to copy and share content (architecture) and expensive to
4790 copy and share content (market). Finally, those penalties are mitigated by
4791 norms we all recognize
—kids, for example, taping other kids'
4792 records. These uses of copyrighted material may well be infringement, but
4793 the norms of our society (before the Internet, at least) had no problem with
4794 this form of infringement.
4796 Enter the Internet, or, more precisely, technologies such as MP3s and p2p
4797 sharing. Now the constraint of architecture changes dramatically, as does
4798 the constraint of the market. And as both the market and architecture relax
4799 the regulation of copyright, norms pile on. The happy balance (for the
4800 warriors, at least) of life before the Internet becomes an effective state
4801 of anarchy after the Internet.
4804 Thus the sense of, and justification for, the warriors' response.
4805 Technology has changed, the warriors say, and the effect of this change,
4806 when ramified through the market and norms, is that a balance of protection
4807 for the copyright owners' rights has been lost. This is Iraq after the fall
4808 of Saddam, but this time no government is justifying the looting that
4810 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1381"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.4. effective state of anarchy after the Internet.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1381.png" alt=
"effective state of anarchy after the Internet."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
4811 Neither this analysis nor the conclusions that follow are new to the
4812 warriors. Indeed, in a "White Paper" prepared by the Commerce Department
4813 (one heavily influenced by the copyright warriors) in
1995, this mix of
4814 regulatory modalities had already been identified and the strategy to
4815 respond already mapped. In response to the changes the Internet had
4816 effected, the White Paper argued (
1) Congress should strengthen intellectual
4817 property law, (
2) businesses should adopt innovative marketing techniques,
4818 (
3) technologists should push to develop code to protect copyrighted
4819 material, and (
4) educators should educate kids to better protect copyright.
4822 This mixed strategy is just what copyright needed
—if it was to
4823 preserve the particular balance that existed before the change induced by
4824 the Internet. And it's just what we should expect the content industry to
4825 push for. It is as American as apple pie to consider the happy life you have
4826 as an entitlement, and to look to the law to protect it if something comes
4827 along to change that happy life. Homeowners living in a flood plain have no
4828 hesitation appealing to the government to rebuild (and rebuild again) when a
4829 flood (architecture) wipes away their property (law). Farmers have no
4830 hesitation appealing to the government to bail them out when a virus
4831 (architecture) devastates their crop. Unions have no hesitation appealing to
4832 the government to bail them out when imports (market) wipe out the
4833 U.S. steel industry.
4835 Thus, there's nothing wrong or surprising in the content industry's campaign
4836 to protect itself from the harmful consequences of a technological
4837 innovation. And I would be the last person to argue that the changing
4838 technology of the Internet has not had a profound effect on the content
4839 industry's way of doing business, or as John Seely Brown describes it, its
4840 "architecture of revenue."
4842 But just because a particular interest asks for government support, it
4843 doesn't follow that support should be granted. And just because technology
4844 has weakened a particular way of doing business, it doesn't follow that the
4845 government should intervene to support that old way of doing
4846 business. Kodak, for example, has lost perhaps as much as
20 percent of
4847 their traditional film market to the emerging technologies of digital
4848 cameras.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2956542" href=
"#ftn.id2956542" class=
"footnote">122</a>]
</sup> Does anyone believe the
4849 government should ban digital cameras just to support Kodak? Highways have
4850 weakened the freight business for railroads. Does anyone think we should ban
4851 trucks from roads
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>for the purpose of
</em></span> protecting the
4852 railroads? Closer to the subject of this book, remote channel changers have
4853 weakened the "stickiness" of television advertising (if a boring commercial
4854 comes on the TV, the remote makes it easy to surf ), and it may well be that
4855 this change has weakened the television advertising market. But does anyone
4856 believe we should regulate remotes to reinforce commercial television?
4857 (Maybe by limiting them to function only once a second, or to switch to only
4858 ten channels within an hour?)
4860 The obvious answer to these obviously rhetorical questions is no. In a free
4861 society, with a free market, supported by free enterprise and free trade,
4862 the government's role is not to support one way of doing business against
4863 others. Its role is not to pick winners and protect them against loss. If
4864 the government did this generally, then we would never have any progress. As
4865 Microsoft chairman Bill Gates wrote in
1991, in a memo criticizing software
4866 patents, "established companies have an interest in excluding future
4867 competitors."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2956592" href=
"#ftn.id2956592" class=
"footnote">123</a>]
</sup> And relative to a
4868 startup, established companies also have the means. (Think RCA and FM
4869 radio.) A world in which competitors with new ideas must fight not only the
4870 market but also the government is a world in which competitors with new
4871 ideas will not succeed. It is a world of stasis and increasingly
4872 concentrated stagnation. It is the Soviet Union under Brezhnev.
4873 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2956611"></a>
4875 Thus, while it is understandable for industries threatened with new
4876 technologies that change the way they do business to look to the government
4877 for protection, it is the special duty of policy makers to guarantee that
4878 that protection not become a deterrent to progress. It is the duty of policy
4879 makers, in other words, to assure that the changes they create, in response
4880 to the request of those hurt by changing technology, are changes that
4881 preserve the incentives and opportunities for innovation and change.
4883 In the context of laws regulating speech
—which include, obviously,
4884 copyright law
—that duty is even stronger. When the industry
4885 complaining about changing technologies is asking Congress to respond in a
4886 way that burdens speech and creativity, policy makers should be especially
4887 wary of the request. It is always a bad deal for the government to get into
4888 the business of regulating speech markets. The risks and dangers of that
4889 game are precisely why our framers created the First Amendment to our
4890 Constitution: "Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of
4891 speech." So when Congress is being asked to pass laws that would "abridge"
4892 the freedom of speech, it should ask
— carefully
—whether such
4893 regulation is justified.
4896 My argument just now, however, has nothing to do with whether the changes
4897 that are being pushed by the copyright warriors are "justified." My argument
4898 is about their effect. For before we get to the question of justification, a
4899 hard question that depends a great deal upon your values, we should first
4900 ask whether we understand the effect of the changes the content industry
4903 Her kommer metaforen som vil forklare argumentet.
4904 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxddt"></a><p>
4905 In
1873, the chemical DDT was first synthesized. In
1948, Swiss chemist Paul
4906 Hermann Müller won the Nobel Prize for his work demonstrating the
4907 insecticidal properties of DDT. By the
1950s, the insecticide was widely
4908 used around the world to kill disease-carrying pests. It was also used to
4909 increase farm production.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2956688"></a>
4911 No one doubts that killing disease-carrying pests or increasing crop
4912 production is a good thing. No one doubts that the work of Müller was
4913 important and valuable and probably saved lives, possibly millions.
4914 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2956706"></a><p>
4915 But in
1962, Rachel Carson published
<em class=
"citetitle">Silent Spring
</em>,
4916 which argued that DDT, whatever its primary benefits, was also having
4917 unintended environmental consequences. Birds were losing the ability to
4918 reproduce. Whole chains of the ecology were being destroyed.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2956722"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2956728"></a>
4920 No one set out to destroy the environment. Paul Müller certainly did not aim
4921 to harm any birds. But the effort to solve one set of problems produced
4922 another set which, in the view of some, was far worse than the problems that
4923 were originally attacked. Or more accurately, the problems DDT caused were
4924 worse than the problems it solved, at least when considering the other, more
4925 environmentally friendly ways to solve the problems that DDT was meant to
4929 It is to this image precisely that Duke University law professor James Boyle
4930 appeals when he argues that we need an "environmentalism" for
4931 culture.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2956757" href=
"#ftn.id2956757" class=
"footnote">124</a>]
</sup> His point, and the point I
4932 want to develop in the balance of this chapter, is not that the aims of
4933 copyright are flawed. Or that authors should not be paid for their work. Or
4934 that music should be given away "for free." The point is that some of the
4935 ways in which we might protect authors will have unintended consequences for
4936 the cultural environment, much like DDT had for the natural environment. And
4937 just as criticism of DDT is not an endorsement of malaria or an attack on
4938 farmers, so, too, is criticism of one particular set of regulations
4939 protecting copyright not an endorsement of anarchy or an attack on authors.
4940 It is an environment of creativity that we seek, and we should be aware of
4941 our actions' effects on the environment.
4943 My argument, in the balance of this chapter, tries to map exactly this
4944 effect. No doubt the technology of the Internet has had a dramatic effect on
4945 the ability of copyright owners to protect their content. But there should
4946 also be little doubt that when you add together the changes in copyright law
4947 over time, plus the change in technology that the Internet is undergoing
4948 just now, the net effect of these changes will not be only that copyrighted
4949 work is effectively protected. Also, and generally missed, the net effect of
4950 this massive increase in protection will be devastating to the environment
4953 In a line: To kill a gnat, we are spraying DDT with consequences for free
4954 culture that will be far more devastating than that this gnat will be lost.
4955 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2956802"></a></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Opphav"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"beginnings"></a>Opphav
</h2></div></div></div><p>
4956 America copied English copyright law. Actually, we copied and improved
4957 English copyright law. Our Constitution makes the purpose of "creative
4958 property" rights clear; its express limitations reinforce the English aim to
4959 avoid overly powerful publishers.
4961 The power to establish "creative property" rights is granted to Congress in
4962 a way that, for our Constitution, at least, is very odd. Article I, section
4963 8, clause
8 of our Constitution states that:
4966 Congress has the power to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts,
4967 by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right
4968 to their respective Writings and Discoveries. We can call this the
4969 "Progress Clause," for notice what this clause does not say. It does not say
4970 Congress has the power to grant "creative property rights." It says that
4971 Congress has the power
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>to promote progress
</em></span>. The grant
4972 of power is its purpose, and its purpose is a public one, not the purpose of
4973 enriching publishers, nor even primarily the purpose of rewarding authors.
4975 The Progress Clause expressly limits the term of copyrights. As we saw in
4976 chapter
6, the English limited the term of copyright so as to assure that a
4977 few would not exercise disproportionate control over culture by exercising
4978 disproportionate control over publishing. We can assume the framers followed
4979 the English for a similar purpose. Indeed, unlike the English, the framers
4980 reinforced that objective, by requiring that copyrights extend "to Authors"
4983 The design of the Progress Clause reflects something about the
4984 Constitution's design in general. To avoid a problem, the framers built
4985 structure. To prevent the concentrated power of publishers, they built a
4986 structure that kept copyrights away from publishers and kept them short. To
4987 prevent the concentrated power of a church, they banned the federal
4988 government from establishing a church. To prevent concentrating power in the
4989 federal government, they built structures to reinforce the power of the
4990 states
—including the Senate, whose members were at the time selected
4991 by the states, and an electoral college, also selected by the states, to
4992 select the president. In each case, a
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>structure
</em></span> built
4993 checks and balances into the constitutional frame, structured to prevent
4994 otherwise inevitable concentrations of power.
4996 I doubt the framers would recognize the regulation we call "copyright"
4997 today. The scope of that regulation is far beyond anything they ever
4998 considered. To begin to understand what they did, we need to put our
4999 "copyright" in context: We need to see how it has changed in the
210 years
5000 since they first struck its design.
5003 Some of these changes come from the law: some in light of changes in
5004 technology, and some in light of changes in technology given a particular
5005 concentration of market power. In terms of our model, we started here:
5006 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1441"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.5. Copyright's regulation before the Internet.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1331.png" alt=
"Copyright's regulation before the Internet."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5007 Vi kommer til å ende opp her:
5008 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1442"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.6. "Opphavsrett" i dag.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1442.png" alt='
"Opphavsrett" i dag.'
></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5010 La meg forklare hvordan.
5012 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Loven: Varighet"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"lawduration"></a>Loven: Varighet
</h2></div></div></div><p>
5013 When the first Congress enacted laws to protect creative property, it faced
5014 the same uncertainty about the status of creative property that the English
5015 had confronted in
1774. Many states had passed laws protecting creative
5016 property, and some believed that these laws simply supplemented common law
5017 rights that already protected creative authorship.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2956954" href=
"#ftn.id2956954" class=
"footnote">125</a>]
</sup> This meant that there was no guaranteed public
5018 domain in the United States in
1790. If copyrights were protected by the
5019 common law, then there was no simple way to know whether a work published in
5020 the United States was controlled or free. Just as in England, this lingering
5021 uncertainty would make it hard for publishers to rely upon a public domain
5022 to reprint and distribute works.
5024 That uncertainty ended after Congress passed legislation granting
5025 copyrights. Because federal law overrides any contrary state law, federal
5026 protections for copyrighted works displaced any state law protections. Just
5027 as in England the Statute of Anne eventually meant that the copyrights for
5028 all English works expired, a federal statute meant that any state copyrights
5031 In
1790, Congress enacted the first copyright law. It created a federal
5032 copyright and secured that copyright for fourteen years. If the author was
5033 alive at the end of that fourteen years, then he could opt to renew the
5034 copyright for another fourteen years. If he did not renew the copyright, his
5035 work passed into the public domain.
5037 Selv om det ble skapt mange verker i USA i de første
10 årene til
5038 republikken, så ble kun
5 prosent av verkene registrert under det føderale
5039 opphavsrettsregimet. Av alle verker skapt i USA både før
1790 og fra
1790
5040 fram til
1800, så ble
95 prosent øyeblikkelig allemannseie (public
5041 domain). Resten ble allemannseie etter maksimalt
20 år, og som oftest etter
5042 14 år.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2957019" href=
"#ftn.id2957019" class=
"footnote">126</a>]
</sup>
5045 Dette fornyelsessystemet var en avgjørende del av det amerikanske systemet
5046 for opphavsrett. Det sikret at maksimal vernetid i opphavsretten bare ble
5047 gitt til verker der det var ønsket. Etter den første perioden på fjorten år,
5048 hvis forfatteren ikke så verdien av å fornye sin opphavsrett, var det heller
5049 ikke verdt det for samfunnet å håndheve opphavsretten.
5051 Fourteen years may not seem long to us, but for the vast majority of
5052 copyright owners at that time, it was long enough: Only a small minority of
5053 them renewed their copyright after fourteen years; the balance allowed their
5054 work to pass into the public domain.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2957086" href=
"#ftn.id2957086" class=
"footnote">127</a>]
</sup>
5056 Even today, this structure would make sense. Most creative work has an
5057 actual commercial life of just a couple of years. Most books fall out of
5058 print after one year.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2957115" href=
"#ftn.id2957115" class=
"footnote">128</a>]
</sup> When that
5059 happens, the used books are traded free of copyright regulation. Thus the
5060 books are no longer
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>effectively
</em></span> controlled by
5061 copyright. The only practical commercial use of the books at that time is to
5062 sell the books as used books; that use
—because it does not involve
5063 publication
—is effectively free.
5065 In the first hundred years of the Republic, the term of copyright was
5066 changed once. In
1831, the term was increased from a maximum of
28 years to
5067 a maximum of
42 by increasing the initial term of copyright from
14 years to
5068 28 years. In the next fifty years of the Republic, the term increased once
5069 again. In
1909, Congress extended the renewal term of
14 years to
28 years,
5070 setting a maximum term of
56 years.
5072 Then, beginning in
1962, Congress started a practice that has defined
5073 copyright law since. Eleven times in the last forty years, Congress has
5074 extended the terms of existing copyrights; twice in those forty years,
5075 Congress extended the term of future copyrights. Initially, the extensions
5076 of existing copyrights were short, a mere one to two years. In
1976,
5077 Congress extended all existing copyrights by nineteen years. And in
1998,
5078 in the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, Congress extended the term
5079 of existing and future copyrights by twenty years.
5082 The effect of these extensions is simply to toll, or delay, the passing of
5083 works into the public domain. This latest extension means that the public
5084 domain will have been tolled for thirty-nine out of fifty-five years, or
70
5085 percent of the time since
1962. Thus, in the twenty years after the Sonny
5086 Bono Act, while one million patents will pass into the public domain, zero
5087 copyrights will pass into the public domain by virtue of the expiration of a
5090 The effect of these extensions has been exacerbated by another,
5091 little-noticed change in the copyright law. Remember I said that the framers
5092 established a two-part copyright regime, requiring a copyright owner to
5093 renew his copyright after an initial term. The requirement of renewal meant
5094 that works that no longer needed copyright protection would pass more
5095 quickly into the public domain. The works remaining under protection would
5096 be those that had some continuing commercial value.
5098 The United States abandoned this sensible system in
1976. For all works
5099 created after
1978, there was only one copyright term
—the maximum
5100 term. For "natural" authors, that term was life plus fifty years. For
5101 corporations, the term was seventy-five years. Then, in
1992, Congress
5102 abandoned the renewal requirement for all works created before
1978. All
5103 works still under copyright would be accorded the maximum term then
5104 available. After the Sonny Bono Act, that term was ninety-five years.
5106 This change meant that American law no longer had an automatic way to assure
5107 that works that were no longer exploited passed into the public domain. And
5108 indeed, after these changes, it is unclear whether it is even possible to
5109 put works into the public domain. The public domain is orphaned by these
5110 changes in copyright law. Despite the requirement that terms be "limited,"
5111 we have no evidence that anything will limit them.
5113 The effect of these changes on the average duration of copyright is
5114 dramatic. In
1973, more than
85 percent of copyright owners failed to renew
5115 their copyright. That meant that the average term of copyright in
1973 was
5116 just
32.2 years. Because of the elimination of the renewal requirement, the
5117 average term of copyright is now the maximum term. In thirty years, then,
5118 the average term has tripled, from
32.2 years to
95 years.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2957210" href=
"#ftn.id2957210" class=
"footnote">129</a>]
</sup>
5119 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Loven: Virkeområde"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"lawscope"></a>Loven: Virkeområde
</h2></div></div></div><p>
5120 The "scope" of a copyright is the range of rights granted by the law. The
5121 scope of American copyright has changed dramatically. Those changes are not
5122 necessarily bad. But we should understand the extent of the changes if we're
5123 to keep this debate in context.
5125 In
1790, that scope was very narrow. Copyright covered only "maps, charts,
5126 and books." That means it didn't cover, for example, music or
5127 architecture. More significantly, the right granted by a copyright gave the
5128 author the exclusive right to "publish" copyrighted works. That means
5129 someone else violated the copyright only if he republished the work without
5130 the copyright owner's permission. Finally, the right granted by a copyright
5131 was an exclusive right to that particular book. The right did not extend to
5132 what lawyers call "derivative works." It would not, therefore, interfere
5133 with the right of someone other than the author to translate a copyrighted
5134 book, or to adapt the story to a different form (such as a drama based on a
5137 This, too, has changed dramatically. While the contours of copyright today
5138 are extremely hard to describe simply, in general terms, the right covers
5139 practically any creative work that is reduced to a tangible form. It covers
5140 music as well as architecture, drama as well as computer programs. It gives
5141 the copyright owner of that creative work not only the exclusive right to
5142 "publish" the work, but also the exclusive right of control over any
5143 "copies" of that work. And most significant for our purposes here, the right
5144 gives the copyright owner control over not only his or her particular work,
5145 but also any "derivative work" that might grow out of the original work. In
5146 this way, the right covers more creative work, protects the creative work
5147 more broadly, and protects works that are based in a significant way on the
5148 initial creative work.
5151 At the same time that the scope of copyright has expanded, procedural
5152 limitations on the right have been relaxed. I've already described the
5153 complete removal of the renewal requirement in
1992. In addition to the
5154 renewal requirement, for most of the history of American copyright law,
5155 there was a requirement that a work be registered before it could receive
5156 the protection of a copyright. There was also a requirement that any
5157 copyrighted work be marked either with that famous © or the word
5158 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>copyright
</em></span>. And for most of the history of American
5159 copyright law, there was a requirement that works be deposited with the
5160 government before a copyright could be secured.
5162 The reason for the registration requirement was the sensible understanding
5163 that for most works, no copyright was required. Again, in the first ten
5164 years of the Republic,
95 percent of works eligible for copyright were never
5165 copyrighted. Thus, the rule reflected the norm: Most works apparently didn't
5166 need copyright, so registration narrowed the regulation of the law to the
5167 few that did. The same reasoning justified the requirement that a work be
5168 marked as copyrighted
—that way it was easy to know whether a copyright
5169 was being claimed. The requirement that works be deposited was to assure
5170 that after the copyright expired, there would be a copy of the work
5171 somewhere so that it could be copied by others without locating the original
5174 All of these "formalities" were abolished in the American system when we
5175 decided to follow European copyright law. There is no requirement that you
5176 register a work to get a copyright; the copyright now is automatic; the
5177 copyright exists whether or not you mark your work with a ©; and the
5178 copyright exists whether or not you actually make a copy available for
5181 Vurder et praktisk eksempel for å forstå omfanget av disse forskjellene.
5183 If, in
1790, you wrote a book and you were one of the
5 percent who actually
5184 copyrighted that book, then the copyright law protected you against another
5185 publisher's taking your book and republishing it without your
5186 permission. The aim of the act was to regulate publishers so as to prevent
5187 that kind of unfair competition. In
1790, there were
174 publishers in the
5188 United States.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2957334" href=
"#ftn.id2957334" class=
"footnote">130</a>]
</sup> The Copyright Act was
5189 thus a tiny regulation of a tiny proportion of a tiny part of the creative
5190 market in the United States
—publishers.
5194 The act left other creators totally unregulated. If I copied your poem by
5195 hand, over and over again, as a way to learn it by heart, my act was totally
5196 unregulated by the
1790 act. If I took your novel and made a play based upon
5197 it, or if I translated it or abridged it, none of those activities were
5198 regulated by the original copyright act. These creative activities remained
5199 free, while the activities of publishers were restrained.
5201 Today the story is very different: If you write a book, your book is
5202 automatically protected. Indeed, not just your book. Every e-mail, every
5203 note to your spouse, every doodle,
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>every
</em></span> creative act
5204 that's reduced to a tangible form
—all of this is automatically
5205 copyrighted. There is no need to register or mark your work. The protection
5206 follows the creation, not the steps you take to protect it.
5208 That protection gives you the right (subject to a narrow range of fair use
5209 exceptions) to control how others copy the work, whether they copy it to
5210 republish it or to share an excerpt.
5212 That much is the obvious part. Any system of copyright would control
5213 competing publishing. But there's a second part to the copyright of today
5214 that is not at all obvious. This is the protection of "derivative rights."
5215 If you write a book, no one can make a movie out of your book without
5216 permission. No one can translate it without permission. CliffsNotes can't
5217 make an abridgment unless permission is granted. All of these derivative
5218 uses of your original work are controlled by the copyright holder. The
5219 copyright, in other words, is now not just an exclusive right to your
5220 writings, but an exclusive right to your writings and a large proportion of
5221 the writings inspired by them.
5223 It is this derivative right that would seem most bizarre to our framers,
5224 though it has become second nature to us. Initially, this expansion was
5225 created to deal with obvious evasions of a narrower copyright. If I write a
5226 book, can you change one word and then claim a copyright in a new and
5227 different book? Obviously that would make a joke of the copyright, so the
5228 law was properly expanded to include those slight modifications as well as
5229 the verbatim original work.
5232 In preventing that joke, the law created an astonishing power within a free
5233 culture
—at least, it's astonishing when you understand that the law
5234 applies not just to the commercial publisher but to anyone with a
5235 computer. I understand the wrong in duplicating and selling someone else's
5236 work. But whatever
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>that
</em></span> wrong is, transforming someone
5237 else's work is a different wrong. Some view transformation as no wrong at
5238 all
—they believe that our law, as the framers penned it, should not
5239 protect derivative rights at all.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2957415" href=
"#ftn.id2957415" class=
"footnote">131</a>]
</sup>
5240 Whether or not you go that far, it seems plain that whatever wrong is
5241 involved is fundamentally different from the wrong of direct piracy.
5243 Yet copyright law treats these two different wrongs in the same way. I can
5244 go to court and get an injunction against your pirating my book. I can go to
5245 court and get an injunction against your transformative use of my
5246 book.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2957461" href=
"#ftn.id2957461" class=
"footnote">132</a>]
</sup> These two different uses of my
5247 creative work are treated the same.
5249 This again may seem right to you. If I wrote a book, then why should you be
5250 able to write a movie that takes my story and makes money from it without
5251 paying me or crediting me? Or if Disney creates a creature called "Mickey
5252 Mouse," why should you be able to make Mickey Mouse toys and be the one to
5253 trade on the value that Disney originally created?
5255 These are good arguments, and, in general, my point is not that the
5256 derivative right is unjustified. My aim just now is much narrower: simply to
5257 make clear that this expansion is a significant change from the rights
5259 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Lov og arkitektur: Rekkevidde"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"lawreach"></a>Lov og arkitektur: Rekkevidde
</h2></div></div></div><p>
5260 Whereas originally the law regulated only publishers, the change in
5261 copyright's scope means that the law today regulates publishers, users, and
5262 authors. It regulates them because all three are capable of making copies,
5263 and the core of the regulation of copyright law is copies.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2957512" href=
"#ftn.id2957512" class=
"footnote">133</a>]
</sup>
5267 "Copies." That certainly sounds like the obvious thing for
5268 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>copy
</em></span>right law to regulate. But as with Jack Valenti's
5269 argument at the start of this chapter, that "creative property" deserves the
5270 "same rights" as all other property, it is the
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>obvious
</em></span>
5271 that we need to be most careful about. For while it may be obvious that in
5272 the world before the Internet, copies were the obvious trigger for copyright
5273 law, upon reflection, it should be obvious that in the world with the
5274 Internet, copies should
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>not
</em></span> be the trigger for
5275 copyright law. More precisely, they should not
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>always
</em></span>
5276 be the trigger for copyright law.
5278 This is perhaps the central claim of this book, so let me take this very
5279 slowly so that the point is not easily missed. My claim is that the Internet
5280 should at least force us to rethink the conditions under which the law of
5281 copyright automatically applies,
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2957573" href=
"#ftn.id2957573" class=
"footnote">134</a>]
</sup>
5282 because it is clear that the current reach of copyright was never
5283 contemplated, much less chosen, by the legislators who enacted copyright
5286 We can see this point abstractly by beginning with this largely empty
5288 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1521"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.7. Alle potensielle bruk av en bok.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1521.png" alt=
"Alle potensielle bruk av en bok."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5291 Think about a book in real space, and imagine this circle to represent all
5292 its potential
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>uses
</em></span>. Most of these uses are unregulated
5293 by copyright law, because the uses don't create a copy. If you read a book,
5294 that act is not regulated by copyright law. If you give someone the book,
5295 that act is not regulated by copyright law. If you resell a book, that act
5296 is not regulated (copyright law expressly states that after the first sale
5297 of a book, the copyright owner can impose no further conditions on the
5298 disposition of the book). If you sleep on the book or use it to hold up a
5299 lamp or let your puppy chew it up, those acts are not regulated by copyright
5300 law, because those acts do not make a copy.
5301 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1531"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.8. Eksempler på uregulert bruk av en bok.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1531.png" alt=
"Eksempler på uregulert bruk av en bok."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5302 Obviously, however, some uses of a copyrighted book are regulated by
5303 copyright law. Republishing the book, for example, makes a copy. It is
5304 therefore regulated by copyright law. Indeed, this particular use stands at
5305 the core of this circle of possible uses of a copyrighted work. It is the
5306 paradigmatic use properly regulated by copyright regulation (see first
5307 diagram on next page).
5309 Til slutt er det en tynn skive av ellers regulert kopierings-bruk som
5310 forblir uregluert på grunn av at loven anser dette som "rimelig bruk".
5311 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1541"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.9. Republishing stands at the core of this circle of possible uses of a
5312 copyrighted work.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1541.png" alt=
"Republishing stands at the core of this circle of possible uses of a copyrighted work."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5313 These are uses that themselves involve copying, but which the law treats as
5314 unregulated because public policy demands that they remain unregulated. You
5315 are free to quote from this book, even in a review that is quite negative,
5316 without my permission, even though that quoting makes a copy. That copy
5317 would ordinarily give the copyright owner the exclusive right to say whether
5318 the copy is allowed or not, but the law denies the owner any exclusive right
5319 over such "fair uses" for public policy (and possibly First Amendment)
5321 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1542"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.10. Uregulert kopiering anses som "rimelig bruk".
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1542.png" alt='Uregulert kopiering anses som
"rimelig bruk".'
></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p> </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1551"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.11. Uses that before were presumptively unregulated are now presumptively
5322 regulated.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1551.png" alt=
"Uses that before were presumptively unregulated are now presumptively regulated."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5325 In real space, then, the possible uses of a book are divided into three
5326 sorts: (
1) unregulated uses, (
2) regulated uses, and (
3) regulated uses that
5327 are nonetheless deemed "fair" regardless of the copyright owner's views.
5329 Enter the Internet
—a distributed, digital network where every use of a
5330 copyrighted work produces a copy.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2957519" href=
"#ftn.id2957519" class=
"footnote">135</a>]
</sup> And
5331 because of this single, arbitrary feature of the design of a digital
5332 network, the scope of category
1 changes dramatically. Uses that before were
5333 presumptively unregulated are now presumptively regulated. No longer is
5334 there a set of presumptively unregulated uses that define a freedom
5335 associated with a copyrighted work. Instead, each use is now subject to the
5336 copyright, because each use also makes a copy
—category
1 gets sucked
5337 into category
2. And those who would defend the unregulated uses of
5338 copyrighted work must look exclusively to category
3, fair uses, to bear the
5339 burden of this shift.
5342 So let's be very specific to make this general point clear. Before the
5343 Internet, if you purchased a book and read it ten times, there would be no
5344 plausible
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>copyright
</em></span>-related argument that the copyright
5345 owner could make to control that use of her book. Copyright law would have
5346 nothing to say about whether you read the book once, ten times, or every
5347 night before you went to bed. None of those instances of
5348 use
—reading
— could be regulated by copyright law because none of
5349 those uses produced a copy.
5351 But the same book as an e-book is effectively governed by a different set of
5352 rules. Now if the copyright owner says you may read the book only once or
5353 only once a month, then
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>copyright law
</em></span> would aid the
5354 copyright owner in exercising this degree of control, because of the
5355 accidental feature of copyright law that triggers its application upon there
5356 being a copy. Now if you read the book ten times and the license says you
5357 may read it only five times, then whenever you read the book (or any portion
5358 of it) beyond the fifth time, you are making a copy of the book contrary to
5359 the copyright owner's wish.
5361 There are some people who think this makes perfect sense. My aim just now is
5362 not to argue about whether it makes sense or not. My aim is only to make
5363 clear the change. Once you see this point, a few other points also become
5366 First, making category
1 disappear is not anything any policy maker ever
5367 intended. Congress did not think through the collapse of the presumptively
5368 unregulated uses of copyrighted works. There is no evidence at all that
5369 policy makers had this idea in mind when they allowed our policy here to
5370 shift. Unregulated uses were an important part of free culture before the
5373 Second, this shift is especially troubling in the context of transformative
5374 uses of creative content. Again, we can all understand the wrong in
5375 commercial piracy. But the law now purports to regulate
5376 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>any
</em></span> transformation you make of creative work using a
5377 machine. "Copy and paste" and "cut and paste" become crimes. Tinkering with
5378 a story and releasing it to others exposes the tinkerer to at least a
5379 requirement of justification. However troubling the expansion with respect
5380 to copying a particular work, it is extraordinarily troubling with respect
5381 to transformative uses of creative work.
5384 Third, this shift from category
1 to category
2 puts an extraordinary burden
5385 on category
3 ("fair use") that fair use never before had to bear. If a
5386 copyright owner now tried to control how many times I could read a book
5387 on-line, the natural response would be to argue that this is a violation of
5388 my fair use rights. But there has never been any litigation about whether I
5389 have a fair use right to read, because before the Internet, reading did not
5390 trigger the application of copyright law and hence the need for a fair use
5391 defense. The right to read was effectively protected before because reading
5394 This point about fair use is totally ignored, even by advocates for free
5395 culture. We have been cornered into arguing that our rights depend upon fair
5396 use
—never even addressing the earlier question about the expansion in
5397 effective regulation. A thin protection grounded in fair use makes sense
5398 when the vast majority of uses are
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>unregulated
</em></span>. But
5399 when everything becomes presumptively regulated, then the protections of
5400 fair use are not enough.
5402 The case of Video Pipeline is a good example. Video Pipeline was in the
5403 business of making "trailer" advertisements for movies available to video
5404 stores. The video stores displayed the trailers as a way to sell
5405 videos. Video Pipeline got the trailers from the film distributors, put the
5406 trailers on tape, and sold the tapes to the retail stores.
5408 The company did this for about fifteen years. Then, in
1997, it began to
5409 think about the Internet as another way to distribute these previews. The
5410 idea was to expand their "selling by sampling" technique by giving on-line
5411 stores the same ability to enable "browsing." Just as in a bookstore you can
5412 read a few pages of a book before you buy the book, so, too, you would be
5413 able to sample a bit from the movie on-line before you bought it.
5416 In
1998, Video Pipeline informed Disney and other film distributors that it
5417 intended to distribute the trailers through the Internet (rather than
5418 sending the tapes) to distributors of their videos. Two years later, Disney
5419 told Video Pipeline to stop. The owner of Video Pipeline asked Disney to
5420 talk about the matter
—he had built a business on distributing this
5421 content as a way to help sell Disney films; he had customers who depended
5422 upon his delivering this content. Disney would agree to talk only if Video
5423 Pipeline stopped the distribution immediately. Video Pipeline thought it
5424 was within their "fair use" rights to distribute the clips as they had. So
5425 they filed a lawsuit to ask the court to declare that these rights were in
5428 Disney countersued
—for $
100 million in damages. Those damages were
5429 predicated upon a claim that Video Pipeline had "willfully infringed" on
5430 Disney's copyright. When a court makes a finding of willful infringement, it
5431 can award damages not on the basis of the actual harm to the copyright
5432 owner, but on the basis of an amount set in the statute. Because Video
5433 Pipeline had distributed seven hundred clips of Disney movies to enable
5434 video stores to sell copies of those movies, Disney was now suing Video
5435 Pipeline for $
100 million.
5437 Disney has the right to control its property, of course. But the video
5438 stores that were selling Disney's films also had some sort of right to be
5439 able to sell the films that they had bought from Disney. Disney's claim in
5440 court was that the stores were allowed to sell the films and they were
5441 permitted to list the titles of the films they were selling, but they were
5442 not allowed to show clips of the films as a way of selling them without
5443 Disney's permission.
5445 Now, you might think this is a close case, and I think the courts would
5446 consider it a close case. My point here is to map the change that gives
5447 Disney this power. Before the Internet, Disney couldn't really control how
5448 people got access to their content. Once a video was in the marketplace, the
5449 "first-sale doctrine" would free the seller to use the video as he wished,
5450 including showing portions of it in order to engender sales of the entire
5451 movie video. But with the Internet, it becomes possible for Disney to
5452 centralize control over access to this content. Because each use of the
5453 Internet produces a copy, use on the Internet becomes subject to the
5454 copyright owner's control. The technology expands the scope of effective
5455 control, because the technology builds a copy into every transaction.
5459 No doubt, a potential is not yet an abuse, and so the potential for control
5460 is not yet the abuse of control. Barnes
& Noble has the right to say you
5461 can't touch a book in their store; property law gives them that right. But
5462 the market effectively protects against that abuse. If Barnes
& Noble
5463 banned browsing, then consumers would choose other bookstores. Competition
5464 protects against the extremes. And it may well be (my argument so far does
5465 not even question this) that competition would prevent any similar danger
5466 when it comes to copyright. Sure, publishers exercising the rights that
5467 authors have assigned to them might try to regulate how many times you read
5468 a book, or try to stop you from sharing the book with anyone. But in a
5469 competitive market such as the book market, the dangers of this happening
5472 Again, my aim so far is simply to map the changes that this changed
5473 architecture enables. Enabling technology to enforce the control of
5474 copyright means that the control of copyright is no longer defined by
5475 balanced policy. The control of copyright is simply what private owners
5476 choose. In some contexts, at least, that fact is harmless. But in some
5477 contexts it is a recipe for disaster.
5478 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Arkitektur og lov: Makt"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"lawforce"></a>Arkitektur og lov: Makt
</h2></div></div></div><p>
5479 The disappearance of unregulated uses would be change enough, but a second
5480 important change brought about by the Internet magnifies its
5481 significance. This second change does not affect the reach of copyright
5482 regulation; it affects how such regulation is enforced.
5484 In the world before digital technology, it was generally the law that
5485 controlled whether and how someone was regulated by copyright law. The law,
5486 meaning a court, meaning a judge: In the end, it was a human, trained in the
5487 tradition of the law and cognizant of the balances that tradition embraced,
5488 who said whether and how the law would restrict your freedom.
5489 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2958007"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxmarxbrothers"></a><p>
5490 Det er en berømt historie om en kamp mellom Marx-brødrene (the Marx
5491 Brothers) og Warner Brothers. Marx-brødrene planla å lage en parodi av
5492 <em class=
"citetitle">Casablanca
</em>. Warner Brothers protesterte. De skrev et
5493 ufint brev til Marx-brødrene og advarte dem om at det ville få seriøse
5494 juridiske konsekvenser hvis de gikk videre med sin plan.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2958042" href=
"#ftn.id2958042" class=
"footnote">136</a>]
</sup>
5496 Dette fikk Marx-brødrene til å svare tilbake med samme mynt. De advarte
5497 Warner Brothers om at Marx-brødrene "var brødre lenge før dere var
5498 det".
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2958063" href=
"#ftn.id2958063" class=
"footnote">137</a>]
</sup> Marx-brødrene eide derfor ordet
5499 <em class=
"citetitle">Brothers
</em>, og hvis Warner Brothers insisterte på å
5500 forsøke å kontrollere
<em class=
"citetitle">Casablanca
</em>, så ville
5501 Marx-brødrene insistere på kontroll over
<em class=
"citetitle">Brothers
</em>.
5503 Det var en absurd og hul trussel, selvfølgelig, fordi Warner Brothers, på
5504 samme måte som Marx-brødrene, visste at ingen domstol noensinne ville
5505 håndheve et slikt dumt krav. Denne ekstremismen var irrelevant for de ekte
5506 friheter som alle (inkludert Warner Brothers) nøt godt av.
5508 On the Internet, however, there is no check on silly rules, because on the
5509 Internet, increasingly, rules are enforced not by a human but by a machine:
5510 Increasingly, the rules of copyright law, as interpreted by the copyright
5511 owner, get built into the technology that delivers copyrighted content. It
5512 is code, rather than law, that rules. And the problem with code regulations
5513 is that, unlike law, code has no shame. Code would not get the humor of the
5514 Marx Brothers. The consequence of that is not at all funny.
5515 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2958121"></a><p>
5516 La oss se på livet til min Adobe eBook Reader.
5518 En ebok er en bok levert i elektronisk form. En Adobe eBook er ikke en bok
5519 som Adobe har publisert. Adobe produserer kun programvaren som utgivere
5520 bruker å levere e-bøker. Den bidrar med teknologien, og utgiveren leverer
5521 innholdet ved hjelp av teknologien.
5523 On the next page is a picture of an old version of my Adobe eBook Reader.
5526 As you can see, I have a small collection of e-books within this e-book
5527 library. Some of these books reproduce content that is in the public domain:
5528 <em class=
"citetitle">Middlemarch
</em>, for example, is in the public domain.
5529 Some of them reproduce content that is not in the public domain: My own book
5530 <em class=
"citetitle">The Future of Ideas
</em> is not yet within the public
5531 domain. Consider
<em class=
"citetitle">Middlemarch
</em> first. If you click on
5532 my e-book copy of
<em class=
"citetitle">Middlemarch
</em>, you'll see a fancy
5533 cover, and then a button at the bottom called Permissions.
5534 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1611"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.12. Bilde av en gammel versjon av Adobe eBook Reader.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1611.png" alt=
"Bilde av en gammel versjon av Adobe eBook Reader."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5535 If you click on the Permissions button, you'll see a list of the permissions
5536 that the publisher purports to grant with this book.
5537 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1612"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.13. List of the permissions that the publisher purports to grant.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1612.png" alt=
"List of the permissions that the publisher purports to grant."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5540 According to my eBook Reader, I have the permission to copy to the clipboard
5541 of the computer ten text selections every ten days. (So far, I've copied no
5542 text to the clipboard.) I also have the permission to print ten pages from
5543 the book every ten days. Lastly, I have the permission to use the Read Aloud
5544 button to hear
<em class=
"citetitle">Middlemarch
</em> read aloud through the
5547 Here's the e-book for another work in the public domain (including the
5548 translation): Aristotle's
<em class=
"citetitle">Politics
</em>.
5549 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1621"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.14. E-book of Aristotle;s "Politics"
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1621.png" alt='E-book of Aristotle;s
"Politics"'
></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5550 According to its permissions, no printing or copying is permitted at
5551 all. But fortunately, you can use the Read Aloud button to hear the book.
5552 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1622"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.15. Liste med tillatelser for Aristotles "Politics".
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1622.png" alt='Liste med tillatelser for Aristotles
"Politics".'
></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5553 Finally (and most embarrassingly), here are the permissions for the original
5554 e-book version of my last book,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Future of Ideas
</em>:
5555 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1631"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.16. List of the permissions for "The Future of Ideas".
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1631.png" alt='List of the permissions for
"The Future of Ideas".'
></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5556 Ingen kopiering, ingen utskrift, og våg ikke å prøve å lytte til denne
5559 Now, the Adobe eBook Reader calls these controls "permissions"
— as if
5560 the publisher has the power to control how you use these works. For works
5561 under copyright, the copyright owner certainly does have the power
—up
5562 to the limits of the copyright law. But for work not under copyright, there
5563 is no such copyright power.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2958304" href=
"#ftn.id2958304" class=
"footnote">138</a>]
</sup> When my
5564 e-book of
<em class=
"citetitle">Middlemarch
</em> says I have the permission to
5565 copy only ten text selections into the memory every ten days, what that
5566 really means is that the eBook Reader has enabled the publisher to control
5567 how I use the book on my computer, far beyond the control that the law would
5570 The control comes instead from the code
—from the technology within
5571 which the e-book "lives." Though the e-book says that these are permissions,
5572 they are not the sort of "permissions" that most of us deal with. When a
5573 teenager gets "permission" to stay out till midnight, she knows (unless
5574 she's Cinderella) that she can stay out till
2 A.M., but will suffer a
5575 punishment if she's caught. But when the Adobe eBook Reader says I have the
5576 permission to make ten copies of the text into the computer's memory, that
5577 means that after I've made ten copies, the computer will not make any
5578 more. The same with the printing restrictions: After ten pages, the eBook
5579 Reader will not print any more pages. It's the same with the silly
5580 restriction that says that you can't use the Read Aloud button to read my
5581 book aloud
—it's not that the company will sue you if you do; instead,
5582 if you push the Read Aloud button with my book, the machine simply won't
5586 These are
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>controls
</em></span>, not permissions. Imagine a world
5587 where the Marx Brothers sold word processing software that, when you tried
5588 to type "Warner Brothers," erased "Brothers" from the sentence.
5589 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2958360"></a>
5591 This is the future of copyright law: not so much copyright
5592 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>law
</em></span> as copyright
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>code
</em></span>. The
5593 controls over access to content will not be controls that are ratified by
5594 courts; the controls over access to content will be controls that are coded
5595 by programmers. And whereas the controls that are built into the law are
5596 always to be checked by a judge, the controls that are built into the
5597 technology have no similar built-in check.
5599 How significant is this? Isn't it always possible to get around the controls
5600 built into the technology? Software used to be sold with technologies that
5601 limited the ability of users to copy the software, but those were trivial
5602 protections to defeat. Why won't it be trivial to defeat these protections
5605 We've only scratched the surface of this story. Return to the Adobe eBook
5608 Early in the life of the Adobe eBook Reader, Adobe suffered a public
5609 relations nightmare. Among the books that you could download for free on the
5610 Adobe site was a copy of
<em class=
"citetitle">Alice's Adventures in
5611 Wonderland
</em>. This wonderful book is in the public domain. Yet
5612 when you clicked on Permissions for that book, you got the following report:
5613 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1641"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.17. List of the permissions for "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland".
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1641.png" alt=
"List of the permissions for "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5616 Here was a public domain children's book that you were not allowed to copy,
5617 not allowed to lend, not allowed to give, and, as the "permissions"
5618 indicated, not allowed to "read aloud"!
5620 The public relations nightmare attached to that final permission. For the
5621 text did not say that you were not permitted to use the Read Aloud button;
5622 it said you did not have the permission to read the book aloud. That led
5623 some people to think that Adobe was restricting the right of parents, for
5624 example, to read the book to their children, which seemed, to say the least,
5627 Adobe responded quickly that it was absurd to think that it was trying to
5628 restrict the right to read a book aloud. Obviously it was only restricting
5629 the ability to use the Read Aloud button to have the book read aloud. But
5630 the question Adobe never did answer is this: Would Adobe thus agree that a
5631 consumer was free to use software to hack around the restrictions built into
5632 the eBook Reader? If some company (call it Elcomsoft) developed a program to
5633 disable the technological protection built into an Adobe eBook so that a
5634 blind person, say, could use a computer to read the book aloud, would Adobe
5635 agree that such a use of an eBook Reader was fair? Adobe didn't answer
5636 because the answer, however absurd it might seem, is no.
5638 The point is not to blame Adobe. Indeed, Adobe is among the most innovative
5639 companies developing strategies to balance open access to content with
5640 incentives for companies to innovate. But Adobe's technology enables
5641 control, and Adobe has an incentive to defend this control. That incentive
5642 is understandable, yet what it creates is often crazy.
5644 To see the point in a particularly absurd context, consider a favorite story
5645 of mine that makes the same point.
5646 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxaibo"></a><p>
5647 Consider the robotic dog made by Sony named "Aibo." The Aibo learns tricks,
5648 cuddles, and follows you around. It eats only electricity and that doesn't
5649 leave that much of a mess (at least in your house).
5652 The Aibo is expensive and popular. Fans from around the world have set up
5653 clubs to trade stories. One fan in particular set up a Web site to enable
5654 information about the Aibo dog to be shared. This fan set up aibopet.com
5655 (and aibohack.com, but that resolves to the same site), and on that site he
5656 provided information about how to teach an Aibo to do tricks in addition to
5657 the ones Sony had taught it.
5659 "Teach" here has a special meaning. Aibos are just cute computers. You
5660 teach a computer how to do something by programming it differently. So to
5661 say that aibopet.com was giving information about how to teach the dog to do
5662 new tricks is just to say that aibopet.com was giving information to users
5663 of the Aibo pet about how to hack their computer "dog" to make it do new
5664 tricks (thus, aibohack.com).
5666 If you're not a programmer or don't know many programmers, the word
5667 <em class=
"citetitle">hack
</em> has a particularly unfriendly
5668 connotation. Nonprogrammers hack bushes or weeds. Nonprogrammers in horror
5669 movies do even worse. But to programmers, or coders, as I call them,
5670 <em class=
"citetitle">hack
</em> is a much more positive
5671 term.
<em class=
"citetitle">Hack
</em> just means code that enables the program
5672 to do something it wasn't originally intended or enabled to do. If you buy a
5673 new printer for an old computer, you might find the old computer doesn't
5674 run, or "drive," the printer. If you discovered that, you'd later be happy
5675 to discover a hack on the Net by someone who has written a driver to enable
5676 the computer to drive the printer you just bought.
5678 Some hacks are easy. Some are unbelievably hard. Hackers as a community like
5679 to challenge themselves and others with increasingly difficult
5680 tasks. There's a certain respect that goes with the talent to hack
5681 well. There's a well-deserved respect that goes with the talent to hack
5684 The Aibo fan was displaying a bit of both when he hacked the program and
5685 offered to the world a bit of code that would enable the Aibo to dance
5686 jazz. The dog wasn't programmed to dance jazz. It was a clever bit of
5687 tinkering that turned the dog into a more talented creature than Sony had
5689 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2958564"></a><p>
5691 I've told this story in many contexts, both inside and outside the United
5692 States. Once I was asked by a puzzled member of the audience, is it
5693 permissible for a dog to dance jazz in the United States? We forget that
5694 stories about the backcountry still flow across much of the world. So let's
5695 just be clear before we continue: It's not a crime anywhere (anymore) to
5696 dance jazz. Nor is it a crime to teach your dog to dance jazz. Nor should it
5697 be a crime (though we don't have a lot to go on here) to teach your robot
5698 dog to dance jazz. Dancing jazz is a completely legal activity. One imagines
5699 that the owner of aibopet.com thought,
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>What possible problem could
5700 there be with teaching a robot dog to dance?
</em></span>
5702 Let's put the dog to sleep for a minute, and turn to a pony show
— not
5703 literally a pony show, but rather a paper that a Princeton academic named Ed
5704 Felten prepared for a conference. This Princeton academic is well known and
5705 respected. He was hired by the government in the Microsoft case to test
5706 Microsoft's claims about what could and could not be done with its own
5707 code. In that trial, he demonstrated both his brilliance and his
5708 coolness. Under heavy badgering by Microsoft lawyers, Ed Felten stood his
5709 ground. He was not about to be bullied into being silent about something he
5712 But Felten's bravery was really tested in April
2001.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2958619" href=
"#ftn.id2958619" class=
"footnote">139</a>]
</sup> He and a group of colleagues were working on a
5713 paper to be submitted at conference. The paper was intended to describe the
5714 weakness in an encryption system being developed by the Secure Digital Music
5715 Initiative as a technique to control the distribution of music.
5717 The SDMI coalition had as its goal a technology to enable content owners to
5718 exercise much better control over their content than the Internet, as it
5719 originally stood, granted them. Using encryption, SDMI hoped to develop a
5720 standard that would allow the content owner to say "this music cannot be
5721 copied," and have a computer respect that command. The technology was to be
5722 part of a "trusted system" of control that would get content owners to trust
5723 the system of the Internet much more.
5725 When SDMI thought it was close to a standard, it set up a competition. In
5726 exchange for providing contestants with the code to an SDMI-encrypted bit of
5727 content, contestants were to try to crack it and, if they did, report the
5728 problems to the consortium.
5732 Felten and his team figured out the encryption system quickly. He and the
5733 team saw the weakness of this system as a type: Many encryption systems
5734 would suffer the same weakness, and Felten and his team thought it
5735 worthwhile to point this out to those who study encryption.
5737 Let's review just what Felten was doing. Again, this is the United
5738 States. We have a principle of free speech. We have this principle not just
5739 because it is the law, but also because it is a really great idea. A
5740 strongly protected tradition of free speech is likely to encourage a wide
5741 range of criticism. That criticism is likely, in turn, to improve the
5742 systems or people or ideas criticized.
5744 What Felten and his colleagues were doing was publishing a paper describing
5745 the weakness in a technology. They were not spreading free music, or
5746 building and deploying this technology. The paper was an academic essay,
5747 unintelligible to most people. But it clearly showed the weakness in the
5748 SDMI system, and why SDMI would not, as presently constituted, succeed.
5750 What links these two, aibopet.com and Felten, is the letters they then
5751 received. Aibopet.com received a letter from Sony about the aibopet.com
5752 hack. Though a jazz-dancing dog is perfectly legal, Sony wrote:
5753 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
5754 Your site contains information providing the means to circumvent AIBO-ware's
5755 copy protection protocol constituting a violation of the anti-circumvention
5756 provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
5757 </p></blockquote></div><p>
5758 And though an academic paper describing the weakness in a system of
5759 encryption should also be perfectly legal, Felten received a letter from an
5760 RIAA lawyer that read:
5761 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
5763 Any disclosure of information gained from participating in the Public
5764 Challenge would be outside the scope of activities permitted by the
5765 Agreement and could subject you and your research team to actions under the
5766 Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA").
5767 </p></blockquote></div><p>
5768 In both cases, this weirdly Orwellian law was invoked to control the spread
5769 of information. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act made spreading such
5770 information an offense.
5772 The DMCA was enacted as a response to copyright owners' first fear about
5773 cyberspace. The fear was that copyright control was effectively dead; the
5774 response was to find technologies that might compensate. These new
5775 technologies would be copyright protection technologies
— technologies
5776 to control the replication and distribution of copyrighted material. They
5777 were designed as
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>code
</em></span> to modify the original
5778 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>code
</em></span> of the Internet, to reestablish some protection
5779 for copyright owners.
5781 The DMCA was a bit of law intended to back up the protection of this code
5782 designed to protect copyrighted material. It was, we could say,
5783 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>legal code
</em></span> intended to buttress
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>software
5784 code
</em></span> which itself was intended to support the
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>legal
5785 code of copyright
</em></span>.
5787 But the DMCA was not designed merely to protect copyrighted works to the
5788 extent copyright law protected them. Its protection, that is, did not end at
5789 the line that copyright law drew. The DMCA regulated devices that were
5790 designed to circumvent copyright protection measures. It was designed to ban
5791 those devices, whether or not the use of the copyrighted material made
5792 possible by that circumvention would have been a copyright violation.
5795 Aibopet.com and Felten make the point. The Aibo hack circumvented a
5796 copyright protection system for the purpose of enabling the dog to dance
5797 jazz. That enablement no doubt involved the use of copyrighted material. But
5798 as aibopet.com's site was noncommercial, and the use did not enable
5799 subsequent copyright infringements, there's no doubt that aibopet.com's hack
5800 was fair use of Sony's copyrighted material. Yet fair use is not a defense
5801 to the DMCA. The question is not whether the use of the copyrighted material
5802 was a copyright violation. The question is whether a copyright protection
5803 system was circumvented.
5805 The threat against Felten was more attenuated, but it followed the same line
5806 of reasoning. By publishing a paper describing how a copyright protection
5807 system could be circumvented, the RIAA lawyer suggested, Felten himself was
5808 distributing a circumvention technology. Thus, even though he was not
5809 himself infringing anyone's copyright, his academic paper was enabling
5810 others to infringe others' copyright.
5812 The bizarreness of these arguments is captured in a cartoon drawn in
1981 by
5813 Paul Conrad. At that time, a court in California had held that the VCR could
5814 be banned because it was a copyright-infringing technology: It enabled
5815 consumers to copy films without the permission of the copyright owner. No
5816 doubt there were uses of the technology that were legal: Fred Rogers, aka
5817 "
<em class=
"citetitle">Mr. Rogers
</em>," for example, had testified in that case
5818 that he wanted people to feel free to tape Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood.
5819 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
5820 Some public stations, as well as commercial stations, program the
5821 "Neighborhood" at hours when some children cannot use it. I think that it's
5822 a real service to families to be able to record such programs and show them
5823 at appropriate times. I have always felt that with the advent of all of this
5824 new technology that allows people to tape the "Neighborhood" off-the-air,
5825 and I'm speaking for the "Neighborhood" because that's what I produce, that
5826 they then become much more active in the programming of their family's
5827 television life. Very frankly, I am opposed to people being programmed by
5828 others. My whole approach in broadcasting has always been "You are an
5829 important person just the way you are. You can make healthy decisions."
5830 Maybe I'm going on too long, but I just feel that anything that allows a
5831 person to be more active in the control of his or her life, in a healthy
5832 way, is important.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2958883" href=
"#ftn.id2958883" class=
"footnote">140</a>]
</sup>
5833 </p></blockquote></div><p>
5836 Even though there were uses that were legal, because there were some uses
5837 that were illegal, the court held the companies producing the VCR
5840 This led Conrad to draw the cartoon below, which we can adopt to the DMCA.
5842 No argument I have can top this picture, but let me try to get close.
5844 The anticircumvention provisions of the DMCA target copyright circumvention
5845 technologies. Circumvention technologies can be used for different
5846 ends. They can be used, for example, to enable massive pirating of
5847 copyrighted material
—a bad end. Or they can be used to enable the use
5848 of particular copyrighted materials in ways that would be considered fair
5849 use
—a good end.
5852 A handgun can be used to shoot a police officer or a child. Most would agree
5853 such a use is bad. Or a handgun can be used for target practice or to
5854 protect against an intruder. At least some would say that such a use would
5855 be good. It, too, is a technology that has both good and bad uses.
5856 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1711"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.18. VCR/handgun cartoon.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1711.png" alt=
"VCR/handgun cartoon."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
5857 The obvious point of Conrad's cartoon is the weirdness of a world where guns
5858 are legal, despite the harm they can do, while VCRs (and circumvention
5859 technologies) are illegal. Flash:
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>No one ever died from copyright
5860 circumvention
</em></span>. Yet the law bans circumvention technologies
5861 absolutely, despite the potential that they might do some good, but permits
5862 guns, despite the obvious and tragic harm they do.
5864 The Aibo and RIAA examples demonstrate how copyright owners are changing the
5865 balance that copyright law grants. Using code, copyright owners restrict
5866 fair use; using the DMCA, they punish those who would attempt to evade the
5867 restrictions on fair use that they impose through code. Technology becomes a
5868 means by which fair use can be erased; the law of the DMCA backs up that
5871 This is how
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>code
</em></span> becomes
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>law
</em></span>. The
5872 controls built into the technology of copy and access protection become
5873 rules the violation of which is also a violation of the law. In this way,
5874 the code extends the law
—increasing its regulation, even if the
5875 subject it regulates (activities that would otherwise plainly constitute
5876 fair use) is beyond the reach of the law. Code becomes law; code extends the
5877 law; code thus extends the control that copyright owners effect
—at
5878 least for those copyright holders with the lawyers who can write the nasty
5879 letters that Felten and aibopet.com received.
5881 There is one final aspect of the interaction between architecture and law
5882 that contributes to the force of copyright's regulation. This is the ease
5883 with which infringements of the law can be detected. For contrary to the
5884 rhetoric common at the birth of cyberspace that on the Internet, no one
5885 knows you're a dog, increasingly, given changing technologies deployed on
5886 the Internet, it is easy to find the dog who committed a legal wrong. The
5887 technologies of the Internet are open to snoops as well as sharers, and the
5888 snoops are increasingly good at tracking down the identity of those who
5893 For example, imagine you were part of a
<em class=
"citetitle">Star Trek
</em> fan
5894 club. You gathered every month to share trivia, and maybe to enact a kind of
5895 fan fiction about the show. One person would play Spock, another, Captain
5896 Kirk. The characters would begin with a plot from a real story, then simply
5897 continue it.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959032" href=
"#ftn.id2959032" class=
"footnote">141</a>]
</sup>
5899 Before the Internet, this was, in effect, a totally unregulated activity.
5900 No matter what happened inside your club room, you would never be interfered
5901 with by the copyright police. You were free in that space to do as you
5902 wished with this part of our culture. You were allowed to build on it as you
5903 wished without fear of legal control.
5905 But if you moved your club onto the Internet, and made it generally
5906 available for others to join, the story would be very different. Bots
5907 scouring the Net for trademark and copyright infringement would quickly find
5908 your site. Your posting of fan fiction, depending upon the ownership of the
5909 series that you're depicting, could well inspire a lawyer's threat. And
5910 ignoring the lawyer's threat would be extremely costly indeed. The law of
5911 copyright is extremely efficient. The penalties are severe, and the process
5914 This change in the effective force of the law is caused by a change in the
5915 ease with which the law can be enforced. That change too shifts the law's
5916 balance radically. It is as if your car transmitted the speed at which you
5917 traveled at every moment that you drove; that would be just one step before
5918 the state started issuing tickets based upon the data you transmitted. That
5919 is, in effect, what is happening here.
5920 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Marked: Konsentrasjon"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"marketconcentration"></a>Marked: Konsentrasjon
</h2></div></div></div><p>
5922 So copyright's duration has increased dramatically
—tripled in the past
5923 thirty years. And copyright's scope has increased as well
—from
5924 regulating only publishers to now regulating just about everyone. And
5925 copyright's reach has changed, as every action becomes a copy and hence
5926 presumptively regulated. And as technologists find better ways to control
5927 the use of content, and as copyright is increasingly enforced through
5928 technology, copyright's force changes, too. Misuse is easier to find and
5929 easier to control. This regulation of the creative process, which began as a
5930 tiny regulation governing a tiny part of the market for creative work, has
5931 become the single most important regulator of creativity there is. It is a
5932 massive expansion in the scope of the government's control over innovation
5933 and creativity; it would be totally unrecognizable to those who gave birth
5934 to copyright's control.
5936 Still, in my view, all of these changes would not matter much if it weren't
5937 for one more change that we must also consider. This is a change that is in
5938 some sense the most familiar, though its significance and scope are not well
5939 understood. It is the one that creates precisely the reason to be concerned
5940 about all the other changes I have described.
5942 This is the change in the concentration and integration of the media. In
5943 the past twenty years, the nature of media ownership has undergone a radical
5944 alteration, caused by changes in legal rules governing the media. Before
5945 this change happened, the different forms of media were owned by separate
5946 media companies. Now, the media is increasingly owned by only a few
5947 companies. Indeed, after the changes that the FCC announced in June
2003,
5948 most expect that within a few years, we will live in a world where just
5949 three companies control more than percent of the media.
5951 Det er her to sorter endringer: omfanget av konsentrasjon, og dens natur.
5952 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959136"></a><p>
5953 Changes in scope are the easier ones to describe. As Senator John McCain
5954 summarized the data produced in the FCC's review of media ownership, "five
5955 companies control
85 percent of our media sources."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959147" href=
"#ftn.id2959147" class=
"footnote">142</a>]
</sup> The five recording labels of Universal Music Group,
5956 BMG, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music Group, and EMI control
84.8
5957 percent of the U.S. music market.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959159" href=
"#ftn.id2959159" class=
"footnote">143</a>]
</sup> The
5958 "five largest cable companies pipe programming to
74 percent of the cable
5959 subscribers nationwide."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959172" href=
"#ftn.id2959172" class=
"footnote">144</a>]
</sup> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959183"></a>
5962 The story with radio is even more dramatic. Before deregulation, the
5963 nation's largest radio broadcasting conglomerate owned fewer than
5964 seventy-five stations. Today
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>one
</em></span> company owns more than
5965 1,
200 stations. During that period of consolidation, the total number of
5966 radio owners dropped by
34 percent. Today, in most markets, the two largest
5967 broadcasters control
74 percent of that market's revenues. Overall, just
5968 four companies control
90 percent of the nation's radio advertising
5971 Newspaper ownership is becoming more concentrated as well. Today, there are
5972 six hundred fewer daily newspapers in the United States than there were
5973 eighty years ago, and ten companies control half of the nation's
5974 circulation. There are twenty major newspaper publishers in the United
5975 States. The top ten film studios receive
99 percent of all film revenue. The
5976 ten largest cable companies account for
85 percent of all cable
5977 revenue. This is a market far from the free press the framers sought to
5978 protect. Indeed, it is a market that is quite well protected
— by the
5981 Concentration in size alone is one thing. The more invidious change is in
5982 the nature of that concentration. As author James Fallows put it in a recent
5983 article about Rupert Murdoch,
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959214"></a>
5984 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
5985 Murdoch's companies now constitute a production system unmatched in its
5986 integration. They supply content
—Fox movies . . . Fox TV shows
5987 . . . Fox-controlled sports broadcasts, plus newspapers and books. They sell
5988 the content to the public and to advertisers
—in newspapers, on the
5989 broadcast network, on the cable channels. And they operate the physical
5990 distribution system through which the content reaches the
5991 customers. Murdoch's satellite systems now distribute News Corp. content in
5992 Europe and Asia; if Murdoch becomes DirecTV's largest single owner, that
5993 system will serve the same function in the United States.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959239" href=
"#ftn.id2959239" class=
"footnote">145</a>]
</sup>
5994 </p></blockquote></div><p>
5995 The pattern with Murdoch is the pattern of modern media. Not just large
5996 companies owning many radio stations, but a few companies owning as many
5997 outlets of media as possible. A picture describes this pattern better than a
5998 thousand words could do:
5999 </p><div class=
"figure"><a name=
"fig-1761"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Figur
11.19. Mønster for moderne mediaeierskap.
</b></p><div class=
"figure-contents"><div><img src=
"images/1761.png" alt=
"Mønster for moderne mediaeierskap."></div></div></div><br class=
"figure-break"><p>
6002 Betyr denne konsentrasjonen noe? Påvirker det hva som blir laget, eller hva
6003 som blir distribuert? Eller er det bare en mer effektiv måte å produsere og
6004 distribuere innhold?
6006 Mitt syn var at konsentrasjonen ikke betød noe. Jeg tenkte det ikke var noe
6007 mer enn en mer effektiv finansiell struktur. Men nå, etter å ha lest og
6008 hørt på en haug av skapere prøve å overbevise meg om det motsatte, har jeg
6009 begynt å endre mening.
6011 Her er en representativ historie som kan foreslå hvorfor denne integreringen
6013 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959318"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959324"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959331"></a><p>
6014 I
1969 laget Norman Lear en polit for
<em class=
"citetitle">All in the
6015 Family
</em>. Han tok piloten til ABC, og nettverket likte det ikke.
6016 Da sa til Lear at det var for på kanten. Gjør det om igjen. Lear lagde
6017 piloten på nytt, mer på kanten enn den første. ABC ble fra seg. Du får
6018 ikke med deg poenget, fortalte de Lear. Vi vil ha det mindre på kanten,
6021 I stedet for å føye seg, to Lear ganske enkelt serien sin til noen andre.
6022 CBS var glad for å ha seriene, og ABC kunne ikke stoppe Lear fra å gå til
6023 andre. Opphavsretten som Lear hadde sikret uavhengighet fra
6024 nettverk-kontroll.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959364" href=
"#ftn.id2959364" class=
"footnote">146</a>]
</sup>
6029 The network did not control those copyrights because the law forbade the
6030 networks from controlling the content they syndicated. The law required a
6031 separation between the networks and the content producers; that separation
6032 would guarantee Lear freedom. And as late as
1992, because of these rules,
6033 the vast majority of prime time television
—75 percent of it
—was
6034 "independent" of the networks.
6036 In
1994, the FCC abandoned the rules that required this independence. After
6037 that change, the networks quickly changed the balance. In
1985, there were
6038 twenty-five independent television production studios; in
2002, only five
6039 independent television studios remained. "In
1992, only
15 percent of new
6040 series were produced for a network by a company it controlled. Last year,
6041 the percentage of shows produced by controlled companies more than
6042 quintupled to
77 percent." "In
1992,
16 new series were produced
6043 independently of conglomerate control, last year there was one."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959394" href=
"#ftn.id2959394" class=
"footnote">147</a>]
</sup> In
2002,
75 percent of prime time television was
6044 owned by the networks that ran it. "In the ten-year period between
1992 and
6045 2002, the number of prime time television hours per week produced by network
6046 studios increased over
200%, whereas the number of prime time television
6047 hours per week produced by independent studios decreased
63%."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959438" href=
"#ftn.id2959438" class=
"footnote">148</a>]
</sup>
6048 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959445"></a><p>
6049 Today, another Norman Lear with another
<em class=
"citetitle">All in the
6050 Family
</em> would find that he had the choice either to make the show
6051 less edgy or to be fired: The content of any show developed for a network is
6052 increasingly owned by the network.
6054 While the number of channels has increased dramatically, the ownership of
6055 those channels has narrowed to an ever smaller and smaller few. As Barry
6056 Diller said to Bill Moyers,
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959467"></a>
6057 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959473"></a>
6058 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
6059 Well, if you have companies that produce, that finance, that air on their
6060 channel and then distribute worldwide everything that goes through their
6061 controlled distribution system, then what you get is fewer and fewer actual
6062 voices participating in the process. [We u]sed to have dozens and dozens of
6063 thriving independent production companies producing television programs. Now
6064 you have less than a handful.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959492" href=
"#ftn.id2959492" class=
"footnote">149</a>]
</sup>
6065 </p></blockquote></div><p>
6066 This narrowing has an effect on what is produced. The product of such large
6067 and concentrated networks is increasingly homogenous. Increasingly
6068 safe. Increasingly sterile. The product of news shows from networks like
6069 this is increasingly tailored to the message the network wants to
6070 convey. This is not the communist party, though from the inside, it must
6071 feel a bit like the communist party. No one can question without risk of
6072 consequence
—not necessarily banishment to Siberia, but punishment
6073 nonetheless. Independent, critical, different views are quashed. This is not
6074 the environment for a democracy.
6075 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959516"></a><p>
6076 Economics itself offers a parallel that explains why this integration
6077 affects creativity. Clay Christensen has written about the "Innovator's
6078 Dilemma": the fact that large traditional firms find it rational to ignore
6079 new, breakthrough technologies that compete with their core business. The
6080 same analysis could help explain why large, traditional media companies
6081 would find it rational to ignore new cultural trends.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959544" href=
"#ftn.id2959544" class=
"footnote">150</a>]
</sup> Lumbering giants not only don't, but should not,
6082 sprint. Yet if the field is only open to the giants, there will be far too
6083 little sprinting.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959572"></a>
6085 I don't think we know enough about the economics of the media market to say
6086 with certainty what concentration and integration will do. The efficiencies
6087 are important, and the effect on culture is hard to measure.
6089 But there is a quintessentially obvious example that does strongly suggest
6092 In addition to the copyright wars, we're in the middle of the drug
6093 wars. Government policy is strongly directed against the drug cartels;
6094 criminal and civil courts are filled with the consequences of this battle.
6097 Let me hereby disqualify myself from any possible appointment to any
6098 position in government by saying I believe this war is a profound mistake. I
6099 am not pro drugs. Indeed, I come from a family once wrecked by
6100 drugs
—though the drugs that wrecked my family were all quite legal. I
6101 believe this war is a profound mistake because the collateral damage from it
6102 is so great as to make waging the war insane. When you add together the
6103 burdens on the criminal justice system, the desperation of generations of
6104 kids whose only real economic opportunities are as drug warriors, the
6105 queering of constitutional protections because of the constant surveillance
6106 this war requires, and, most profoundly, the total destruction of the legal
6107 systems of many South American nations because of the power of the local
6108 drug cartels, I find it impossible to believe that the marginal benefit in
6109 reduced drug consumption by Americans could possibly outweigh these costs.
6111 You may not be convinced. That's fine. We live in a democracy, and it is
6112 through votes that we are to choose policy. But to do that, we depend
6113 fundamentally upon the press to help inform Americans about these issues.
6115 Beginning in
1998, the Office of National Drug Control Policy launched a
6116 media campaign as part of the "war on drugs." The campaign produced scores
6117 of short film clips about issues related to illegal drugs. In one series
6118 (the Nick and Norm series) two men are in a bar, discussing the idea of
6119 legalizing drugs as a way to avoid some of the collateral damage from the
6120 war. One advances an argument in favor of drug legalization. The other
6121 responds in a powerful and effective way against the argument of the
6122 first. In the end, the first guy changes his mind (hey, it's
6123 television). The plug at the end is a damning attack on the pro-legalization
6126 Fair enough. It's a good ad. Not terribly misleading. It delivers its
6127 message well. It's a fair and reasonable message.
6129 But let's say you think it is a wrong message, and you'd like to run a
6130 countercommercial. Say you want to run a series of ads that try to
6131 demonstrate the extraordinary collateral harm that comes from the drug
6135 Well, obviously, these ads cost lots of money. Assume you raise the
6136 money. Assume a group of concerned citizens donates all the money in the
6137 world to help you get your message out. Can you be sure your message will be
6140 No. You cannot. Television stations have a general policy of avoiding
6141 "controversial" ads. Ads sponsored by the government are deemed
6142 uncontroversial; ads disagreeing with the government are controversial.
6143 This selectivity might be thought inconsistent with the First Amendment, but
6144 the Supreme Court has held that stations have the right to choose what they
6145 run. Thus, the major channels of commercial media will refuse one side of a
6146 crucial debate the opportunity to present its case. And the courts will
6147 defend the rights of the stations to be this biased.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959674" href=
"#ftn.id2959674" class=
"footnote">151</a>]
</sup>
6149 I'd be happy to defend the networks' rights, as well
—if we lived in a
6150 media market that was truly diverse. But concentration in the media throws
6151 that condition into doubt. If a handful of companies control access to the
6152 media, and that handful of companies gets to decide which political
6153 positions it will allow to be promoted on its channels, then in an obvious
6154 and important way, concentration matters. You might like the positions the
6155 handful of companies selects. But you should not like a world in which a
6156 mere few get to decide which issues the rest of us get to know about.
6157 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Sammen"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"together"></a>Sammen
</h2></div></div></div><p>
6158 There is something innocent and obvious about the claim of the copyright
6159 warriors that the government should "protect my property." In the abstract,
6160 it is obviously true and, ordinarily, totally harmless. No sane sort who is
6161 not an anarchist could disagree.
6164 But when we see how dramatically this "property" has changed
— when we
6165 recognize how it might now interact with both technology and markets to mean
6166 that the effective constraint on the liberty to cultivate our culture is
6167 dramatically different
—the claim begins to seem less innocent and
6168 obvious. Given (
1) the power of technology to supplement the law's control,
6169 and (
2) the power of concentrated markets to weaken the opportunity for
6170 dissent, if strictly enforcing the massively expanded "property" rights
6171 granted by copyright fundamentally changes the freedom within this culture
6172 to cultivate and build upon our past, then we have to ask whether this
6173 property should be redefined.
6175 Not starkly. Or absolutely. My point is not that we should abolish copyright
6176 or go back to the eighteenth century. That would be a total mistake,
6177 disastrous for the most important creative enterprises within our culture
6180 But there is a space between zero and one, Internet culture
6181 notwithstanding. And these massive shifts in the effective power of
6182 copyright regulation, tied to increased concentration of the content
6183 industry and resting in the hands of technology that will increasingly
6184 enable control over the use of culture, should drive us to consider whether
6185 another adjustment is called for. Not an adjustment that increases
6186 copyright's power. Not an adjustment that increases its term. Rather, an
6187 adjustment to restore the balance that has traditionally defined copyright's
6188 regulation
—a weakening of that regulation, to strengthen creativity.
6190 Copyright law has not been a rock of Gibraltar. It's not a set of constant
6191 commitments that, for some mysterious reason, teenagers and geeks now
6192 flout. Instead, copyright power has grown dramatically in a short period of
6193 time, as the technologies of distribution and creation have changed and as
6194 lobbyists have pushed for more control by copyright holders. Changes in the
6195 past in response to changes in technology suggest that we may well need
6196 similar changes in the future. And these changes have to be
6197 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>reductions
</em></span> in the scope of copyright, in response to
6198 the extraordinary increase in control that technology and the market enable.
6201 For the single point that is lost in this war on pirates is a point that we
6202 see only after surveying the range of these changes. When you add together
6203 the effect of changing law, concentrated markets, and changing technology,
6204 together they produce an astonishing conclusion:
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>Never in our
6205 history have fewer had a legal right to control more of the development of
6206 our culture than now
</em></span>.
6208 Not when copyrights were perpetual, for when copyrights were perpetual, they
6209 affected only that precise creative work. Not when only publishers had the
6210 tools to publish, for the market then was much more diverse. Not when there
6211 were only three television networks, for even then, newspapers, film
6212 studios, radio stations, and publishers were independent of the
6213 networks.
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>Never
</em></span> has copyright protected such a wide
6214 range of rights, against as broad a range of actors, for a term that was
6215 remotely as long. This form of regulation
—a tiny regulation of a tiny
6216 part of the creative energy of a nation at the founding
—is now a
6217 massive regulation of the overall creative process. Law plus technology plus
6218 the market now interact to turn this historically benign regulation into the
6219 most significant regulation of culture that our free society has
6220 known.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2959860" href=
"#ftn.id2959860" class=
"footnote">152</a>]
</sup>
6222 This has been a long chapter. Its point can now be briefly stated.
6224 At the start of this book, I distinguished between commercial and
6225 noncommercial culture. In the course of this chapter, I have distinguished
6226 between copying a work and transforming it. We can now combine these two
6227 distinctions and draw a clear map of the changes that copyright law has
6228 undergone. In
1790, the law looked like this:
6229 </p><div class=
"table"><a name=
"t2"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Tabell
11.1.
</b></p><div class=
"table-contents"><table summary=
"" border=
"1"><colgroup><col><col><col></colgroup><thead><tr><th align=
"char"> </th><th align=
"char">Publiser
</th><th align=
"char">TRANSFORM
</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td align=
"char">Kommersiell
</td><td align=
"char">©
</td><td align=
"char">Fri
</td></tr><tr><td align=
"char">Ikke-kommersiell
</td><td align=
"char">Fri
</td><td align=
"char">Fri
</td></tr></tbody></table></div></div><br class=
"table-break"><p>
6231 The act of publishing a map, chart, and book was regulated by copyright
6232 law. Nothing else was. Transformations were free. And as copyright attached
6233 only with registration, and only those who intended to benefit commercially
6234 would register, copying through publishing of noncommercial work was also
6237 By the end of the nineteenth century, the law had changed to this:
6238 </p><div class=
"table"><a name=
"t3"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Tabell
11.2.
</b></p><div class=
"table-contents"><table summary=
"" border=
"1"><colgroup><col><col><col></colgroup><thead><tr><th align=
"char"> </th><th align=
"char">Publiser
</th><th align=
"char">TRANSFORM
</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td align=
"char">Kommersiell
</td><td align=
"char">©
</td><td align=
"char">©
</td></tr><tr><td align=
"char">Ikke-kommersiell
</td><td align=
"char">Fri
</td><td align=
"char">Fri
</td></tr></tbody></table></div></div><br class=
"table-break"><p>
6239 Derivative works were now regulated by copyright law
—if published,
6240 which again, given the economics of publishing at the time, means if offered
6241 commercially. But noncommercial publishing and transformation were still
6244 In
1909 the law changed to regulate copies, not publishing, and after this
6245 change, the scope of the law was tied to technology. As the technology of
6246 copying became more prevalent, the reach of the law expanded. Thus by
1975,
6247 as photocopying machines became more common, we could say the law began to
6249 </p><div class=
"table"><a name=
"t4"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Tabell
11.3.
</b></p><div class=
"table-contents"><table summary=
"" border=
"1"><colgroup><col><col><col></colgroup><thead><tr><th align=
"char"> </th><th align=
"char">Kopier
</th><th align=
"char">TRANSFORM
</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td align=
"char">Kommersiell
</td><td align=
"char">©
</td><td align=
"char">©
</td></tr><tr><td align=
"char">Ikke-kommersiell
</td><td align=
"char">©/Fri
</td><td align=
"char">Fri
</td></tr></tbody></table></div></div><br class=
"table-break"><p>
6250 The law was interpreted to reach noncommercial copying through, say, copy
6251 machines, but still much of copying outside of the commercial market
6252 remained free. But the consequence of the emergence of digital technologies,
6253 especially in the context of a digital network, means that the law now looks
6255 </p><div class=
"table"><a name=
"t5"></a><p class=
"title"><b>Tabell
11.4.
</b></p><div class=
"table-contents"><table summary=
"" border=
"1"><colgroup><col><col><col></colgroup><thead><tr><th align=
"char"> </th><th align=
"char">Kopier
</th><th align=
"char">TRANSFORM
</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td align=
"char">Kommersiell
</td><td align=
"char">©
</td><td align=
"char">©
</td></tr><tr><td align=
"char">Ikke-kommersiell
</td><td align=
"char">©
</td><td align=
"char">©
</td></tr></tbody></table></div></div><br class=
"table-break"><p>
6257 Every realm is governed by copyright law, whereas before most creativity was
6258 not. The law now regulates the full range of creativity
— commercial or
6259 not, transformative or not
—with the same rules designed to regulate
6260 commercial publishers.
6262 Obviously, copyright law is not the enemy. The enemy is regulation that does
6263 no good. So the question that we should be asking just now is whether
6264 extending the regulations of copyright law into each of these domains
6265 actually does any good.
6267 I have no doubt that it does good in regulating commercial copying. But I
6268 also have no doubt that it does more harm than good when regulating (as it
6269 regulates just now) noncommercial copying and, especially, noncommercial
6270 transformation. And increasingly, for the reasons sketched especially in
6271 chapters
7 and
8, one might well wonder whether it does more harm than good
6272 for commercial transformation. More commercial transformative work would be
6273 created if derivative rights were more sharply restricted.
6275 The issue is therefore not simply whether copyright is property. Of course
6276 copyright is a kind of "property," and of course, as with any property, the
6277 state ought to protect it. But first impressions notwithstanding,
6278 historically, this property right (as with all property rights
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2960204" href=
"#ftn.id2960204" class=
"footnote">153</a>]
</sup>) has been crafted to balance the important need to
6279 give authors and artists incentives with the equally important need to
6280 assure access to creative work. This balance has always been struck in light
6281 of new technologies. And for almost half of our tradition, the "copyright"
6282 did not control
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>at all
</em></span> the freedom of others to build
6283 upon or transform a creative work. American culture was born free, and for
6284 almost
180 years our country consistently protected a vibrant and rich free
6288 We achieved that free culture because our law respected important limits on
6289 the scope of the interests protected by "property." The very birth of
6290 "copyright" as a statutory right recognized those limits, by granting
6291 copyright owners protection for a limited time only (the story of chapter
6292 6). The tradition of "fair use" is animated by a similar concern that is
6293 increasingly under strain as the costs of exercising any fair use right
6294 become unavoidably high (the story of chapter
7). Adding statutory rights
6295 where markets might stifle innovation is another familiar limit on the
6296 property right that copyright is (chapter
8). And granting archives and
6297 libraries a broad freedom to collect, claims of property notwithstanding, is
6298 a crucial part of guaranteeing the soul of a culture (chapter
9). Free
6299 cultures, like free markets, are built with property. But the nature of the
6300 property that builds a free culture is very different from the extremist
6301 vision that dominates the debate today.
6303 Free culture is increasingly the casualty in this war on piracy. In response
6304 to a real, if not yet quantified, threat that the technologies of the
6305 Internet present to twentieth-century business models for producing and
6306 distributing culture, the law and technology are being transformed in a way
6307 that will undermine our tradition of free culture. The property right that
6308 is copyright is no longer the balanced right that it was, or was intended to
6309 be. The property right that is copyright has become unbalanced, tilted
6310 toward an extreme. The opportunity to create and transform becomes weakened
6311 in a world in which creation requires permission and creativity must check
6313 </p></div><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2955894" href=
"#id2955894" class=
"para">118</a>]
</sup>
6316 Home Recording of Copyrighted Works: Hearings on H.R.
4783, H.R.
4794,
6317 H.R.
4808, H.R.
5250, H.R.
5488, and H.R.
5705 Before the Subcommittee on
6318 Courts, Civil Liberties, and the Administration of Justice of the Committee
6319 on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives,
97th Cong.,
2nd
6320 sess. (
1982):
65 (testimony of Jack Valenti).
6321 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2955946" href=
"#id2955946" class=
"para">119</a>]
</sup>
6324 Lawyers speak of "property" not as an absolute thing, but as a bundle of
6325 rights that are sometimes associated with a particular object. Thus, my
6326 "property right" to my car gives me the right to exclusive use, but not the
6327 right to drive at
150 miles an hour. For the best effort to connect the
6328 ordinary meaning of "property" to "lawyer talk," see Bruce Ackerman,
6329 <em class=
"citetitle">Private Property and the Constitution
</em> (New Haven:
6330 Yale University Press,
1977),
26–27.
6331 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2956280" href=
"#id2956280" class=
"para">120</a>]
</sup>
6334 By describing the way law affects the other three modalities, I don't mean
6335 to suggest that the other three don't affect law. Obviously, they do. Law's
6336 only distinction is that it alone speaks as if it has a right
6337 self-consciously to change the other three. The right of the other three is
6338 more timidly expressed. See Lawrence Lessig,
<em class=
"citetitle">Code: And Other
6339 Laws of Cyberspace
</em> (New York: Basic Books,
1999):
90–95;
6340 Lawrence Lessig, "The New Chicago School,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Journal of Legal
6341 Studies
</em>, June
1998.
6342 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2956345" href=
"#id2956345" class=
"para">121</a>]
</sup>
6344 Some people object to this way of talking about "liberty." They object
6345 because their focus when considering the constraints that exist at any
6346 particular moment are constraints imposed exclusively by the government. For
6347 instance, if a storm destroys a bridge, these people think it is meaningless
6348 to say that one's liberty has been restrained. A bridge has washed out, and
6349 it's harder to get from one place to another. To talk about this as a loss
6350 of freedom, they say, is to confuse the stuff of politics with the vagaries
6351 of ordinary life. I don't mean to deny the value in this narrower view,
6352 which depends upon the context of the inquiry. I do, however, mean to argue
6353 against any insistence that this narrower view is the only proper view of
6354 liberty. As I argued in
<em class=
"citetitle">Code
</em>, we come from a long
6355 tradition of political thought with a broader focus than the narrow question
6356 of what the government did when. John Stuart Mill defended freedom of
6357 speech, for example, from the tyranny of narrow minds, not from the fear of
6358 government prosecution; John Stuart Mill,
<em class=
"citetitle">On Liberty
</em>
6359 (Indiana: Hackett Publishing Co.,
1978),
19. John R. Commons famously
6360 defended the economic freedom of labor from constraints imposed by the
6361 market; John R. Commons, "The Right to Work," in Malcom Rutherford and
6362 Warren J. Samuels, eds.,
<em class=
"citetitle">John R. Commons: Selected
6363 Essays
</em> (London: Routledge:
1997),
62. The Americans with
6364 Disabilities Act increases the liberty of people with physical disabilities
6365 by changing the architecture of certain public places, thereby making access
6366 to those places easier;
42 <em class=
"citetitle">United States Code
</em>,
6367 section
12101 (
2000). Each of these interventions to change existing
6368 conditions changes the liberty of a particular group. The effect of those
6369 interventions should be accounted for in order to understand the effective
6370 liberty that each of these groups might face.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2956392"></a>
6371 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2956542" href=
"#id2956542" class=
"para">122</a>]
</sup>
6374 See Geoffrey Smith, "Film vs. Digital: Can Kodak Build a Bridge?"
6375 BusinessWeek online,
2 August
1999, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
23</a>. For a more recent
6376 analysis of Kodak's place in the market, see Chana R. Schoenberger, "Can
6377 Kodak Make Up for Lost Moments?" Forbes.com,
6 October
2003, available at
6378 <a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
24</a>.
6379 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2956592" href=
"#id2956592" class=
"para">123</a>]
</sup>
6382 Fred Warshofsky,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Patent Wars
</em> (New York: Wiley,
6383 1994),
170–71.
6384 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2956757" href=
"#id2956757" class=
"para">124</a>]
</sup>
6387 See, for example, James Boyle, "A Politics of Intellectual Property:
6388 Environmentalism for the Net?"
<em class=
"citetitle">Duke Law Journal
</em> 47
6390 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2956954" href=
"#id2956954" class=
"para">125</a>]
</sup>
6392 William W. Crosskey,
<em class=
"citetitle">Politics and the Constitution in the History
6393 of the United States
</em> (London: Cambridge University Press,
1953),
6394 vol.
1,
485–86: "extinguish[ing], by plain implication of `the supreme
6395 Law of the Land,'
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>the perpetual rights which authors had, or were
6396 supposed by some to have, under the Common Law
</em></span>" (emphasis
6397 added). <a class="indexterm
" name="id2956970
"></a>
6398 </p></div><div class="footnote
"><p><sup>[<a name="ftn.id2957019
" href="#id2957019
" class="para
">126</a>] </sup>
6401 Although 13,000 titles were published in the United States from 1790 to
6402 1799, only 556 copyright registrations were filed; John Tebbel, <em class="citetitle
">A
6403 History of Book Publishing in the United States</em>, vol. 1,
6404 <em class="citetitle
">The Creation of an Industry, 1630–1865</em> (New
6405 York: Bowker, 1972), 141. Of the 21,000 imprints recorded before 1790, only
6406 twelve were copyrighted under the 1790 act; William J. Maher,
6407 <em class="citetitle
">Copyright Term, Retrospective Extension and the Copyright Law of
6408 1790 in Historical Context</em>, 7–10 (2002), available at
6409 <a class="ulink
" href="http://free-culture.cc/notes/
" target="_top
">link #25</a>. Thus, the
6410 overwhelming majority of works fell immediately into the public domain. Even
6411 those works that were copyrighted fell into the public domain quickly,
6412 because the term of copyright was short. The initial term of copyright was
6413 fourteen years, with the option of renewal for an additional fourteen
6414 years. Copyright Act of May 31, 1790, §1, 1 stat. 124. </p></div><div class="footnote
"><p><sup>[<a name="ftn.id2957086
" href="#id2957086
" class="para
">127</a>] </sup>
6417 Few copyright holders ever chose to renew their copyrights. For instance, of
6418 the 25,006 copyrights registered in 1883, only 894 were renewed in 1910. For
6419 a year-by-year analysis of copyright renewal rates, see Barbara A. Ringer,
6420 "Study No.
31: Renewal of Copyright,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Studies on
6421 Copyright
</em>, vol.
1 (New York: Practicing Law Institute,
1963),
6422 618. For a more recent and comprehensive analysis, see William M. Landes and
6423 Richard A. Posner, "Indefinitely Renewable Copyright,"
6424 <em class=
"citetitle">University of Chicago Law Review
</em> 70 (
2003):
471,
6425 498–501, and accompanying figures.
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2957115" href=
"#id2957115" class=
"para">128</a>]
</sup>
6428 Se Ringer, kap.
9, n.
2.
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2957210" href=
"#id2957210" class=
"para">129</a>]
</sup>
6431 These statistics are understated. Between the years
1910 and
1962 (the first
6432 year the renewal term was extended), the average term was never more than
6433 thirty-two years, and averaged thirty years. See Landes and Posner,
6434 "Indefinitely Renewable Copyright," loc. cit.
6435 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2957334" href=
"#id2957334" class=
"para">130</a>]
</sup>
6438 See Thomas Bender and David Sampliner, "Poets, Pirates, and the Creation of
6439 American Literature,"
29 <em class=
"citetitle">New York University Journal of
6440 International Law and Politics
</em> 255 (
1997), and James Gilraeth,
6441 ed., Federal Copyright Records,
1790–1800 (U.S. G.P.O.,
1987).
6443 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2957415" href=
"#id2957415" class=
"para">131</a>]
</sup>
6445 Jonathan Zittrain, "The Copyright Cage,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Legal
6446 Affairs
</em>, July/August
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
26</a>.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2957442"></a>
6447 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2957461" href=
"#id2957461" class=
"para">132</a>]
</sup>
6450 Professor Rubenfeld has presented a powerful constitutional argument about
6451 the difference that copyright law should draw (from the perspective of the
6452 First Amendment) between mere "copies" and derivative works. See Jed
6453 Rubenfeld, "The Freedom of Imagination: Copyright's Constitutionality,"
6454 <em class=
"citetitle">Yale Law Journal
</em> 112 (
2002):
1–60 (see
6455 especially pp.
53–59).
6456 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2957512" href=
"#id2957512" class=
"para">133</a>]
</sup>
6459 This is a simplification of the law, but not much of one. The law certainly
6460 regulates more than "copies"
—a public performance of a copyrighted
6461 song, for example, is regulated even though performance per se doesn't make
6462 a copy;
17 <em class=
"citetitle">United States Code
</em>, section
106(
4). And it
6463 certainly sometimes doesn't regulate a "copy";
17 <em class=
"citetitle">United States
6464 Code
</em>, section
112(a). But the presumption under the existing law
6465 (which regulates "copies;"
17 <em class=
"citetitle">United States Code
</em>,
6466 section
102) is that if there is a copy, there is a right.
6467 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2957573" href=
"#id2957573" class=
"para">134</a>]
</sup>
6470 Thus, my argument is not that in each place that copyright law extends, we
6471 should repeal it. It is instead that we should have a good argument for its
6472 extending where it does, and should not determine its reach on the basis of
6473 arbitrary and automatic changes caused by technology.
6474 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2957519" href=
"#id2957519" class=
"para">135</a>]
</sup>
6477 I don't mean "nature" in the sense that it couldn't be different, but rather
6478 that its present instantiation entails a copy. Optical networks need not
6479 make copies of content they transmit, and a digital network could be
6480 designed to delete anything it copies so that the same number of copies
6482 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2958042" href=
"#id2958042" class=
"para">136</a>]
</sup>
6485 See David Lange, "Recognizing the Public Domain,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Law and
6486 Contemporary Problems
</em> 44 (
1981):
172–73.
6487 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2958063" href=
"#id2958063" class=
"para">137</a>]
</sup>
6489 Ibid. Se også Vaidhyanathan,
<em class=
"citetitle">Copyrights and
6490 Copywrongs
</em>,
1–3.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2958054"></a>
6491 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2958304" href=
"#id2958304" class=
"para">138</a>]
</sup>
6494 In principle, a contract might impose a requirement on me. I might, for
6495 example, buy a book from you that includes a contract that says I will read
6496 it only three times, or that I promise to read it three times. But that
6497 obligation (and the limits for creating that obligation) would come from the
6498 contract, not from copyright law, and the obligations of contract would not
6499 necessarily pass to anyone who subsequently acquired the book.
6500 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2958619" href=
"#id2958619" class=
"para">139</a>]
</sup>
6502 See Pamela Samuelson, "Anticircumvention Rules: Threat to Science,"
6503 <em class=
"citetitle">Science
</em> 293 (
2001):
2028; Brendan I. Koerner,
"Play
6504 Dead: Sony Muzzles the Techies Who Teach a Robot Dog New Tricks,"
6505 <em class=
"citetitle">American Prospect
</em>, January
2002; "Court Dismisses
6506 Computer Scientists' Challenge to DMCA,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Intellectual Property
6507 Litigation Reporter
</em>,
11 December
2001; Bill Holland, "Copyright
6508 Act Raising Free-Speech Concerns,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Billboard
</em>, May
6509 2001; Janelle Brown, "Is the RIAA Running Scared?" Salon.com, April
2001;
6510 Electronic Frontier Foundation, "Frequently Asked Questions about
6511 <em class=
"citetitle">Felten and USENIX
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">RIAA
</em>
6512 Legal Case," available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
6513 #
27</a>.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2958657"></a>
6514 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2958883" href=
"#id2958883" class=
"para">140</a>]
</sup>
6517 <em class=
"citetitle">Sony Corporation of America
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Universal
6518 City Studios, Inc
</em>.,
464 U.S.
417,
455 fn.
27 (
1984). Rogers
6519 never changed his view about the VCR. See James Lardner,
<em class=
"citetitle">Fast
6520 Forward: Hollywood, the Japanese, and the Onslaught of the VCR
</em>
6521 (New York: W. W. Norton,
1987),
270–71.
6522 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959032" href=
"#id2959032" class=
"para">141</a>]
</sup>
6525 For an early and prescient analysis, see Rebecca Tushnet, "Legal Fictions,
6526 Copyright, Fan Fiction, and a New Common Law,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Loyola of Los
6527 Angeles Entertainment Law Journal
</em> 17 (
1997):
651.
6528 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959147" href=
"#id2959147" class=
"para">142</a>]
</sup>
6531 FCC Oversight: Hearing Before the Senate Commerce, Science and
6532 Transportation Committee,
108th Cong.,
1st sess. (
22 May
2003) (statement
6533 of Senator John McCain).
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959159" href=
"#id2959159" class=
"para">143</a>]
</sup>
6536 Lynette Holloway, "Despite a Marketing Blitz, CD Sales Continue to Slide,"
6537 <em class=
"citetitle">New York Times
</em>,
23 December
2002.
6538 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959172" href=
"#id2959172" class=
"para">144</a>]
</sup>
6541 Molly Ivins, "Media Consolidation Must Be Stopped,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Charleston
6542 Gazette
</em>,
31 May
2003.
6543 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959239" href=
"#id2959239" class=
"para">145</a>]
</sup>
6545 James Fallows, "The Age of Murdoch,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Atlantic Monthly
</em>
6546 (September
2003):
89.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959255"></a>
6547 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959364" href=
"#id2959364" class=
"para">146</a>]
</sup>
6550 Leonard Hill, "The Axis of Access," remarks before Weidenbaum Center Forum,
6551 "Entertainment Economics: The Movie Industry," St. Louis, Missouri,
3 April
6552 2003 (transcript of prepared remarks available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
28</a>; for the Lear story,
6553 not included in the prepared remarks, see
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
29</a>).
6554 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959394" href=
"#id2959394" class=
"para">147</a>]
</sup>
6557 NewsCorp./DirecTV Merger and Media Consolidation: Hearings on Media
6558 Ownership Before the Senate Commerce Committee,
108th Cong.,
1st
6559 sess. (
2003) (testimony of Gene Kimmelman on behalf of Consumers Union and
6560 the Consumer Federation of America), available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
30</a>. Kimmelman quotes
6561 Victoria Riskin, president of Writers Guild of America, West, in her Remarks
6562 at FCC En Banc Hearing, Richmond, Virginia,
27 February
2003.
6563 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959438" href=
"#id2959438" class=
"para">148</a>]
</sup>
6567 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959492" href=
"#id2959492" class=
"para">149</a>]
</sup>
6570 "Barry Diller Takes on Media Deregulation,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Now with Bill
6571 Moyers
</em>, Bill Moyers,
25 April
2003, edited transcript available
6572 at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
31</a>.
6573 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959544" href=
"#id2959544" class=
"para">150</a>]
</sup>
6576 Clayton M. Christensen,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Innovator's Dilemma: The
6577 Revolutionary National Bestseller that Changed the Way We Do
6578 Business
</em> (Cambridge: Harvard Business School Press,
6579 1997). Christensen acknowledges that the idea was first suggested by Dean
6580 Kim Clark. See Kim B. Clark, "The Interaction of Design Hierarchies and
6581 Market Concepts in Technological Evolution,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Research
6582 Policy
</em> 14 (
1985):
235–51. For a more recent study, see
6583 Richard Foster and Sarah Kaplan,
<em class=
"citetitle">Creative Destruction: Why
6584 Companies That Are Built to Last Underperform the Market
—and How to
6585 Successfully Transform Them
</em> (New York: Currency/Doubleday,
6586 2001).
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959674" href=
"#id2959674" class=
"para">151</a>]
</sup>
6588 The Marijuana Policy Project, in February
2003, sought to place ads that
6589 directly responded to the Nick and Norm series on stations within the
6590 Washington, D.C., area. Comcast rejected the ads as "against [their]
6591 policy." The local NBC affiliate, WRC, rejected the ads without reviewing
6592 them. The local ABC affiliate, WJOA, originally agreed to run the ads and
6593 accepted payment to do so, but later decided not to run the ads and returned
6594 the collected fees. Interview with Neal Levine,
15 October
2003. These
6595 restrictions are, of course, not limited to drug policy. See, for example,
6596 Nat Ives, "On the Issue of an Iraq War, Advocacy Ads Meet with Rejection
6597 from TV Networks,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New York Times
</em>,
13 March
2003,
6598 C4. Outside of election-related air time there is very little that the FCC
6599 or the courts are willing to do to even the playing field. For a general
6600 overview, see Rhonda Brown, "Ad Hoc Access: The Regulation of Editorial
6601 Advertising on Television and Radio,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Yale Law and Policy
6602 Review
</em> 6 (
1988):
449–79, and for a more recent summary of
6603 the stance of the FCC and the courts, see
<em class=
"citetitle">Radio-Television News
6604 Directors Association
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">FCC
</em>,
184 F.
3d
6605 872 (D.C. Cir.
1999). Municipal authorities exercise the same authority as
6606 the networks. In a recent example from San Francisco, the San Francisco
6607 transit authority rejected an ad that criticized its Muni diesel
6608 buses. Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross, "Antidiesel Group Fuming After Muni
6609 Rejects Ad," SFGate.com,
16 June
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
32</a>. The ground was that
6610 the criticism was "too controversial."
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959722"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959731"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959737"></a>
6611 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2959860" href=
"#id2959860" class=
"para">152</a>]
</sup>
6613 Siva Vaidhyanathan fanger et lignende poeng i hans "fire kapitulasjoner" for
6614 opphavsrettsloven i den digitale tidsalder. Se Vaidhyanathan,
159–60.
6615 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2959700"></a>
6616 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2960204" href=
"#id2960204" class=
"para">153</a>]
</sup>
6619 It was the single most important contribution of the legal realist movement
6620 to demonstrate that all property rights are always crafted to balance public
6621 and private interests. See Thomas C. Grey, "The Disintegration of Property,"
6622 in
<em class=
"citetitle">Nomos XXII: Property
</em>, J. Roland Pennock and John
6623 W. Chapman, eds. (New York: New York University Press,
1980).
6624 </p></div></div></div></div><div class=
"part" title=
"Del III. Nøtter"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h1 class=
"title"><a name=
"c-puzzles"></a>Del III. Nøtter
</h1></div></div></div><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#chimera">12. Kapittel elleve: Chimera
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#harms">13. Kapittel tolv: Skader
</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#constrain">Constraining Creators
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#innovators">Constraining Innovators
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#corruptingcitizens">Corrupting Citizens
</a></span></dt></dl></dd></dl></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 12. Kapittel elleve: Chimera"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"chimera"></a>Kapittel
12. Kapittel elleve: Chimera
</h2></div></div></div><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxchimera"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxwells"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxtcotb"></a><p>
6625 In a well-known short story by H. G. Wells, a mountain climber named Nunez
6626 trips (literally, down an ice slope) into an unknown and isolated valley in
6627 the Peruvian Andes.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2960351" href=
"#ftn.id2960351" class=
"footnote">154</a>]
</sup> The valley is
6628 extraordinarily beautiful, with "sweet water, pasture, an even climate,
6629 slopes of rich brown soil with tangles of a shrub that bore an excellent
6630 fruit." But the villagers are all blind. Nunez takes this as an
6631 opportunity. "In the Country of the Blind," he tells himself, "the One-Eyed
6632 Man is King." So he resolves to live with the villagers to explore life as a
6635 Things don't go quite as he planned. He tries to explain the idea of sight
6636 to the villagers. They don't understand. He tells them they are "blind."
6637 They don't have the word
<em class=
"citetitle">blind
</em>. They think he's just
6638 thick. Indeed, as they increasingly notice the things he can't do (hear the
6639 sound of grass being stepped on, for example), they increasingly try to
6640 control him. He, in turn, becomes increasingly frustrated. "`You don't
6641 understand,' he cried, in a voice that was meant to be great and resolute,
6642 and which broke. `You are blind and I can see. Leave me alone!'"
6646 The villagers don't leave him alone. Nor do they see (so to speak) the
6647 virtue of his special power. Not even the ultimate target of his affection,
6648 a young woman who to him seems "the most beautiful thing in the whole of
6649 creation," understands the beauty of sight. Nunez's description of what he
6650 sees "seemed to her the most poetical of fancies, and she listened to his
6651 description of the stars and the mountains and her own sweet white-lit
6652 beauty as though it was a guilty indulgence." "She did not believe," Wells
6653 tells us, and "she could only half understand, but she was mysteriously
6656 When Nunez announces his desire to marry his "mysteriously delighted" love,
6657 the father and the village object. "You see, my dear," her father instructs,
6658 "he's an idiot. He has delusions. He can't do anything right." They take
6659 Nunez to the village doctor.
6661 After a careful examination, the doctor gives his opinion. "His brain is
6662 affected," he reports.
6664 "What affects it?" the father asks. "Those queer things that are called the
6665 eyes . . . are diseased . . . in such a way as to affect his brain."
6667 The doctor continues: "I think I may say with reasonable certainty that in
6668 order to cure him completely, all that we need to do is a simple and easy
6669 surgical operation
—namely, to remove these irritant bodies [the
6673 "Thank Heaven for science!" says the father to the doctor. They inform Nunez
6674 of this condition necessary for him to be allowed his bride. (You'll have
6675 to read the original to learn what happens in the end. I believe in free
6676 culture, but never in giving away the end of a story.) It sometimes happens
6677 that the eggs of twins fuse in the mother's womb. That fusion produces a
6678 "chimera." A chimera is a single creature with two sets of DNA. The DNA in
6679 the blood, for example, might be different from the DNA of the skin. This
6680 possibility is an underused plot for murder mysteries. "But the DNA shows
6681 with
100 percent certainty that she was not the person whose blood was at
6683 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960446"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960455"></a><p>
6684 Before I had read about chimeras, I would have said they were impossible. A
6685 single person can't have two sets of DNA. The very idea of DNA is that it is
6686 the code of an individual. Yet in fact, not only can two individuals have
6687 the same set of DNA (identical twins), but one person can have two different
6688 sets of DNA (a chimera). Our understanding of a "person" should reflect this
6691 The more I work to understand the current struggle over copyright and
6692 culture, which I've sometimes called unfairly, and sometimes not unfairly
6693 enough, "the copyright wars," the more I think we're dealing with a
6694 chimera. For example, in the battle over the question "What is p2p file
6695 sharing?" both sides have it right, and both sides have it wrong. One side
6696 says, "File sharing is just like two kids taping each others'
6697 records
—the sort of thing we've been doing for the last thirty years
6698 without any question at all." That's true, at least in part. When I tell my
6699 best friend to try out a new CD that I've bought, but rather than just send
6700 the CD, I point him to my p2p server, that is, in all relevant respects,
6701 just like what every executive in every recording company no doubt did as a
6704 But the description is also false in part. For when my p2p server is on a
6705 p2p network through which anyone can get access to my music, then sure, my
6706 friends can get access, but it stretches the meaning of "friends" beyond
6707 recognition to say "my ten thousand best friends" can get access. Whether or
6708 not sharing my music with my best friend is what "we have always been
6709 allowed to do," we have not always been allowed to share music with "our ten
6710 thousand best friends."
6712 Likewise, when the other side says, "File sharing is just like walking into
6713 a Tower Records and taking a CD off the shelf and walking out with it,"
6714 that's true, at least in part. If, after Lyle Lovett (finally) releases a
6715 new album, rather than buying it, I go to Kazaa and find a free copy to
6716 take, that is very much like stealing a copy from Tower.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960480"></a>
6721 But it is not quite stealing from Tower. After all, when I take a CD from
6722 Tower Records, Tower has one less CD to sell. And when I take a CD from
6723 Tower Records, I get a bit of plastic and a cover, and something to show on
6724 my shelves. (And, while we're at it, we could also note that when I take a
6725 CD from Tower Records, the maximum fine that might be imposed on me, under
6726 California law, at least, is $
1,
000. According to the RIAA, by contrast, if
6727 I download a ten-song CD, I'm liable for $
1,
500,
000 in damages.)
6729 The point is not that it is as neither side describes. The point is that it
6730 is both
—both as the RIAA describes it and as Kazaa describes it. It is
6731 a chimera. And rather than simply denying what the other side asserts, we
6732 need to begin to think about how we should respond to this chimera. What
6733 rules should govern it?
6735 We could respond by simply pretending that it is not a chimera. We could,
6736 with the RIAA, decide that every act of file sharing should be a felony. We
6737 could prosecute families for millions of dollars in damages just because
6738 file sharing occurred on a family computer. And we can get universities to
6739 monitor all computer traffic to make sure that no computer is used to commit
6740 this crime. These responses might be extreme, but each of them has either
6741 been proposed or actually implemented.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2960550" href=
"#ftn.id2960550" class=
"footnote">155</a>]
</sup>
6743 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960628"></a><p>
6744 Alternatively, we could respond to file sharing the way many kids act as
6745 though we've responded. We could totally legalize it. Let there be no
6746 copyright liability, either civil or criminal, for making copyrighted
6747 content available on the Net. Make file sharing like gossip: regulated, if
6748 at all, by social norms but not by law.
6750 Either response is possible. I think either would be a mistake. Rather than
6751 embrace one of these two extremes, we should embrace something that
6752 recognizes the truth in both. And while I end this book with a sketch of a
6753 system that does just that, my aim in the next chapter is to show just how
6754 awful it would be for us to adopt the zero-tolerance extreme. I believe
6755 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>either
</em></span> extreme would be worse than a reasonable
6756 alternative. But I believe the zero-tolerance solution would be the worse
6757 of the two extremes.
6762 Yet zero tolerance is increasingly our government's policy. In the middle of
6763 the chaos that the Internet has created, an extraordinary land grab is
6764 occurring. The law and technology are being shifted to give content holders
6765 a kind of control over our culture that they have never had before. And in
6766 this extremism, many an opportunity for new innovation and new creativity
6769 I'm not talking about the opportunities for kids to "steal" music. My focus
6770 instead is the commercial and cultural innovation that this war will also
6771 kill. We have never seen the power to innovate spread so broadly among our
6772 citizens, and we have just begun to see the innovation that this power will
6773 unleash. Yet the Internet has already seen the passing of one cycle of
6774 innovation around technologies to distribute content. The law is responsible
6775 for this passing. As the vice president for global public policy at one of
6776 these new innovators, eMusic.com, put it when criticizing the DMCA's added
6777 protection for copyrighted material,
6778 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
6779 eMusic opposes music piracy. We are a distributor of copyrighted material,
6780 and we want to protect those rights.
6782 But building a technology fortress that locks in the clout of the major
6783 labels is by no means the only way to protect copyright interests, nor is it
6784 necessarily the best. It is simply too early to answer that question. Market
6785 forces operating naturally may very well produce a totally different
6788 This is a critical point. The choices that industry sectors make with
6789 respect to these systems will in many ways directly shape the market for
6790 digital media and the manner in which digital media are distributed. This in
6791 turn will directly influence the options that are available to consumers,
6792 both in terms of the ease with which they will be able to access digital
6793 media and the equipment that they will require to do so. Poor choices made
6794 this early in the game will retard the growth of this market, hurting
6795 everyone's interests.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2960713" href=
"#ftn.id2960713" class=
"footnote">156</a>]
</sup>
6796 </p></blockquote></div><p>
6797 In April
2001, eMusic.com was purchased by Vivendi Universal, one of "the
6798 major labels." Its position on these matters has now changed.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960736"></a>
6800 Reversing our tradition of tolerance now will not merely quash piracy. It
6801 will sacrifice values that are important to this culture, and will kill
6802 opportunities that could be extraordinarily valuable.
6803 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2960351" href=
"#id2960351" class=
"para">154</a>]
</sup>
6806 H. G. Wells, "The Country of the Blind" (
1904,
1911). See H. G. Wells,
6807 <em class=
"citetitle">The Country of the Blind and Other Stories
</em>, Michael
6808 Sherborne, ed. (New York: Oxford University Press,
1996).
6809 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2960550" href=
"#id2960550" class=
"para">155</a>]
</sup>
6811 For an excellent summary, see the report prepared by GartnerG2 and the
6812 Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, "Copyright
6813 and Digital Media in a Post-Napster World,"
27 June
2003, available at
6814 <a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
33</a>. Reps. John
6815 Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) and Howard L. Berman (D-Calif.) have introduced a bill
6816 that would treat unauthorized on-line copying as a felony offense with
6817 punishments ranging as high as five years imprisonment; see Jon Healey,
6818 "House Bill Aims to Up Stakes on Piracy,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Los Angeles
6819 Times
</em>,
17 July
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
34</a>. Civil penalties are
6820 currently set at $
150,
000 per copied song. For a recent (and unsuccessful)
6821 legal challenge to the RIAA's demand that an ISP reveal the identity of a
6822 user accused of sharing more than
600 songs through a family computer, see
6823 <em class=
"citetitle">RIAA
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Verizon Internet Services (In
6824 re. Verizon Internet Services)
</em>,
240 F. Supp.
2d
24
6825 (D.D.C.
2003). Such a user could face liability ranging as high as $
90
6826 million. Such astronomical figures furnish the RIAA with a powerful arsenal
6827 in its prosecution of file sharers. Settlements ranging from $
12,
000 to
6828 $
17,
500 for four students accused of heavy file sharing on university
6829 networks must have seemed a mere pittance next to the $
98 billion the RIAA
6830 could seek should the matter proceed to court. See Elizabeth Young,
6831 "Downloading Could Lead to Fines," redandblack.com, August
2003, available
6832 at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
35</a>. For an
6833 example of the RIAA's targeting of student file sharing, and of the
6834 subpoenas issued to universities to reveal student file-sharer identities,
6835 see James Collins, "RIAA Steps Up Bid to Force BC, MIT to Name Students,"
6836 <em class=
"citetitle">Boston Globe
</em>,
8 August
2003, D3, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
36</a>.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960617"></a>
6837 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2960713" href=
"#id2960713" class=
"para">156</a>]
</sup>
6840 WIPO and the DMCA One Year Later: Assessing Consumer Access to Digital
6841 Entertainment on the Internet and Other Media: Hearing Before the
6842 Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade, and Consumer Protection, House
6843 Committee on Commerce,
106th Cong.
29 (
1999) (statement of Peter Harter,
6844 vice president, Global Public Policy and Standards, EMusic.com), available
6845 in LEXIS, Federal Document Clearing House Congressional Testimony File.
</p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 13. Kapittel tolv: Skader"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"harms"></a>Kapittel
13. Kapittel tolv: Skader
</h2></div></div></div><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#constrain">Constraining Creators
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#innovators">Constraining Innovators
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"section"><a href=
"#corruptingcitizens">Corrupting Citizens
</a></span></dt></dl></div><p>
6847 To fight "piracy," to protect "property," the content industry has launched
6848 a war. Lobbying and lots of campaign contributions have now brought the
6849 government into this war. As with any war, this one will have both direct
6850 and collateral damage. As with any war of prohibition, these damages will be
6851 suffered most by our own people.
6853 My aim so far has been to describe the consequences of this war, in
6854 particular, the consequences for "free culture." But my aim now is to extend
6855 this description of consequences into an argument. Is this war justified?
6857 In my view, it is not. There is no good reason why this time, for the first
6858 time, the law should defend the old against the new, just when the power of
6859 the property called "intellectual property" is at its greatest in our
6861 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960783"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960790"></a><p>
6862 Yet "common sense" does not see it this way. Common sense is still on the
6863 side of the Causbys and the content industry. The extreme claims of control
6864 in the name of property still resonate; the uncritical rejection of "piracy"
6869 There will be many consequences of continuing this war. I want to describe
6870 just three. All three might be said to be unintended. I am quite confident
6871 the third is unintended. I'm less sure about the first two. The first two
6872 protect modern RCAs, but there is no Howard Armstrong in the wings to fight
6873 today's monopolists of culture.
6874 </p><div class=
"section" title=
"Constraining Creators"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"constrain"></a>Constraining Creators
</h2></div></div></div><p>
6875 In the next ten years we will see an explosion of digital technologies.
6876 These technologies will enable almost anyone to capture and share
6877 content. Capturing and sharing content, of course, is what humans have done
6878 since the dawn of man. It is how we learn and communicate. But capturing and
6879 sharing through digital technology is different. The fidelity and power are
6880 different. You could send an e-mail telling someone about a joke you saw on
6881 Comedy Central, or you could send the clip. You could write an essay about
6882 the inconsistencies in the arguments of the politician you most love to
6883 hate, or you could make a short film that puts statement against
6884 statement. You could write a poem to express your love, or you could weave
6885 together a string
—a mash-up
— of songs from your favorite artists
6886 in a collage and make it available on the Net.
6888 This digital "capturing and sharing" is in part an extension of the
6889 capturing and sharing that has always been integral to our culture, and in
6890 part it is something new. It is continuous with the Kodak, but it explodes
6891 the boundaries of Kodak-like technologies. The technology of digital
6892 "capturing and sharing" promises a world of extraordinarily diverse
6893 creativity that can be easily and broadly shared. And as that creativity is
6894 applied to democracy, it will enable a broad range of citizens to use
6895 technology to express and criticize and contribute to the culture all
6899 Teknologien har dermed gitt oss en mulighet til å gjøre noe med kultur som
6900 bare har vært mulig for enkeltpersoner i små grupper, isolert fra andre
6901 grupper. Forestill deg en gammel mann som forteller en historie til en
6902 samling med naboer i en liten landsby. Forestill deg så den samme
6903 historiefortellingen utvidet til å nå over hele verden.
6905 Yet all this is possible only if the activity is presumptively legal. In the
6906 current regime of legal regulation, it is not. Forget file sharing for a
6907 moment. Think about your favorite amazing sites on the Net. Web sites that
6908 offer plot summaries from forgotten television shows; sites that catalog
6909 cartoons from the
1960s; sites that mix images and sound to criticize
6910 politicians or businesses; sites that gather newspaper articles on remote
6911 topics of science or culture. There is a vast amount of creative work spread
6912 across the Internet. But as the law is currently crafted, this work is
6913 presumptively illegal.
6915 That presumption will increasingly chill creativity, as the examples of
6916 extreme penalties for vague infringements continue to proliferate. It is
6917 impossible to get a clear sense of what's allowed and what's not, and at the
6918 same time, the penalties for crossing the line are astonishingly harsh. The
6919 four students who were threatened by the RIAA ( Jesse Jordan of chapter
3
6920 was just one) were threatened with a $
98 billion lawsuit for building search
6921 engines that permitted songs to be copied. Yet World-Com
—which
6922 defrauded investors of $
11 billion, resulting in a loss to investors in
6923 market capitalization of over $
200 billion
—received a fine of a mere
6924 $
750 million.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2960894" href=
"#ftn.id2960894" class=
"footnote">157</a>]
</sup> And under legislation
6925 being pushed in Congress right now, a doctor who negligently removes the
6926 wrong leg in an operation would be liable for no more than $
250,
000 in
6927 damages for pain and suffering.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2960930" href=
"#ftn.id2960930" class=
"footnote">158</a>]
</sup> Can
6928 common sense recognize the absurdity in a world where the maximum fine for
6929 downloading two songs off the Internet is more than the fine for a doctor's
6930 negligently butchering a patient?
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960967"></a>
6932 The consequence of this legal uncertainty, tied to these extremely high
6933 penalties, is that an extraordinary amount of creativity will either never
6934 be exercised, or never be exercised in the open. We drive this creative
6935 process underground by branding the modern-day Walt Disneys "pirates." We
6936 make it impossible for businesses to rely upon a public domain, because the
6937 boundaries of the public domain are designed to be unclear. It never pays to
6938 do anything except pay for the right to create, and hence only those who can
6939 pay are allowed to create. As was the case in the Soviet Union, though for
6940 very different reasons, we will begin to see a world of underground
6941 art
—not because the message is necessarily political, or because the
6942 subject is controversial, but because the very act of creating the art is
6943 legally fraught. Already, exhibits of "illegal art" tour the United
6944 States.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2960533" href=
"#ftn.id2960533" class=
"footnote">159</a>]
</sup> In what does their "illegality"
6945 consist? In the act of mixing the culture around us with an expression that
6946 is critical or reflective.
6948 Part of the reason for this fear of illegality has to do with the changing
6949 law. I described that change in detail in chapter
10. But an even bigger
6950 part has to do with the increasing ease with which infractions can be
6951 tracked. As users of file-sharing systems discovered in
2002, it is a
6952 trivial matter for copyright owners to get courts to order Internet service
6953 providers to reveal who has what content. It is as if your cassette tape
6954 player transmitted a list of the songs that you played in the privacy of
6955 your own home that anyone could tune into for whatever reason they chose.
6957 Never in our history has a painter had to worry about whether his painting
6958 infringed on someone else's work; but the modern-day painter, using the
6959 tools of Photoshop, sharing content on the Web, must worry all the
6960 time. Images are all around, but the only safe images to use in the act of
6961 creation are those purchased from Corbis or another image farm. And in
6962 purchasing, censoring happens. There is a free market in pencils; we needn't
6963 worry about its effect on creativity. But there is a highly regulated,
6964 monopolized market in cultural icons; the right to cultivate and transform
6965 them is not similarly free.
6967 Lawyers rarely see this because lawyers are rarely empirical. As I described
6968 in chapter
7, in response to the story about documentary filmmaker Jon Else,
6969 I have been lectured again and again by lawyers who insist Else's use was
6970 fair use, and hence I am wrong to say that the law regulates such a use.
6975 But fair use in America simply means the right to hire a lawyer to defend
6976 your right to create. And as lawyers love to forget, our system for
6977 defending rights such as fair use is astonishingly bad
—in practically
6978 every context, but especially here. It costs too much, it delivers too
6979 slowly, and what it delivers often has little connection to the justice
6980 underlying the claim. The legal system may be tolerable for the very rich.
6981 For everyone else, it is an embarrassment to a tradition that prides itself
6984 Judges and lawyers can tell themselves that fair use provides adequate
6985 "breathing room" between regulation by the law and the access the law should
6986 allow. But it is a measure of how out of touch our legal system has become
6987 that anyone actually believes this. The rules that publishers impose upon
6988 writers, the rules that film distributors impose upon filmmakers, the rules
6989 that newspapers impose upon journalists
— these are the real laws
6990 governing creativity. And these rules have little relationship to the "law"
6991 with which judges comfort themselves.
6993 For in a world that threatens $
150,
000 for a single willful infringement of
6994 a copyright, and which demands tens of thousands of dollars to even defend
6995 against a copyright infringement claim, and which would never return to the
6996 wrongfully accused defendant anything of the costs she suffered to defend
6997 her right to speak
—in that world, the astonishingly broad regulations
6998 that pass under the name "copyright" silence speech and creativity. And in
6999 that world, it takes a studied blindness for people to continue to believe
7000 they live in a culture that is free.
7002 As Jed Horovitz, the businessman behind Video Pipeline, said to me,
7003 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
7005 We're losing [creative] opportunities right and left. Creative people are
7006 being forced not to express themselves. Thoughts are not being
7007 expressed. And while a lot of stuff may [still] be created, it still won't
7008 get distributed. Even if the stuff gets made . . . you're not going to get
7009 it distributed in the mainstream media unless you've got a little note from
7010 a lawyer saying, "This has been cleared." You're not even going to get it on
7011 PBS without that kind of permission. That's the point at which they control
7013 </p></blockquote></div></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Constraining Innovators"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"innovators"></a>Constraining Innovators
</h2></div></div></div><p>
7014 The story of the last section was a crunchy-lefty story
—creativity
7015 quashed, artists who can't speak, yada yada yada. Maybe that doesn't get you
7016 going. Maybe you think there's enough weird art out there, and enough
7017 expression that is critical of what seems to be just about everything. And
7018 if you think that, you might think there's little in this story to worry
7021 But there's an aspect of this story that is not lefty in any sense. Indeed,
7022 it is an aspect that could be written by the most extreme promarket
7023 ideologue. And if you're one of these sorts (and a special one at that,
188
7024 pages into a book like this), then you can see this other aspect by
7025 substituting "free market" every place I've spoken of "free culture." The
7026 point is the same, even if the interests affecting culture are more
7029 The charge I've been making about the regulation of culture is the same
7030 charge free marketers make about regulating markets. Everyone, of course,
7031 concedes that some regulation of markets is necessary
—at a minimum, we
7032 need rules of property and contract, and courts to enforce both. Likewise,
7033 in this culture debate, everyone concedes that at least some framework of
7034 copyright is also required. But both perspectives vehemently insist that
7035 just because some regulation is good, it doesn't follow that more regulation
7036 is better. And both perspectives are constantly attuned to the ways in which
7037 regulation simply enables the powerful industries of today to protect
7038 themselves against the competitors of tomorrow.
7039 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961149"></a><p>
7041 This is the single most dramatic effect of the shift in regulatory strategy
7042 that I described in chapter
10. The consequence of this massive threat of
7043 liability tied to the murky boundaries of copyright law is that innovators
7044 who want to innovate in this space can safely innovate only if they have the
7045 sign-off from last generation's dominant industries. That lesson has been
7046 taught through a series of cases that were designed and executed to teach
7047 venture capitalists a lesson. That lesson
—what former Napster CEO Hank
7048 Barry calls a "nuclear pall" that has fallen over the Valley
—has been
7051 Consider one example to make the point, a story whose beginning I told in
7052 <em class=
"citetitle">The Future of Ideas
</em> and which has progressed in a way
7053 that even I (pessimist extraordinaire) would never have predicted.
7055 In
1997, Michael Roberts launched a company called MP3.com. MP3.com was
7056 keen to remake the music business. Their goal was not just to facilitate new
7057 ways to get access to content. Their goal was also to facilitate new ways to
7058 create content. Unlike the major labels, MP3.com offered creators a venue to
7059 distribute their creativity, without demanding an exclusive engagement from
7062 To make this system work, however, MP3.com needed a reliable way to
7063 recommend music to its users. The idea behind this alternative was to
7064 leverage the revealed preferences of music listeners to recommend new
7065 artists. If you like Lyle Lovett, you're likely to enjoy Bonnie Raitt. And
7066 so on.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961212"></a>
7068 This idea required a simple way to gather data about user preferences.
7069 MP3.com came up with an extraordinarily clever way to gather this preference
7070 data. In January
2000, the company launched a service called
7071 my.mp3.com. Using software provided by MP3.com, a user would sign into an
7072 account and then insert into her computer a CD. The software would identify
7073 the CD, and then give the user access to that content. So, for example, if
7074 you inserted a CD by Jill Sobule, then wherever you were
—at work or at
7075 home
—you could get access to that music once you signed into your
7076 account. The system was therefore a kind of music-lockbox.
7079 No doubt some could use this system to illegally copy content. But that
7080 opportunity existed with or without MP3.com. The aim of the my.mp3.com
7081 service was to give users access to their own content, and as a by-product,
7082 by seeing the content they already owned, to discover the kind of content
7085 To make this system function, however, MP3.com needed to copy
50,
000 CDs to
7086 a server. (In principle, it could have been the user who uploaded the music,
7087 but that would have taken a great deal of time, and would have produced a
7088 product of questionable quality.) It therefore purchased
50,
000 CDs from a
7089 store, and started the process of making copies of those CDs. Again, it
7090 would not serve the content from those copies to anyone except those who
7091 authenticated that they had a copy of the CD they wanted to access. So while
7092 this was
50,
000 copies, it was
50,
000 copies directed at giving customers
7093 something they had already bought.
7094 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxvivendiuniversal"></a><p>
7095 Nine days after MP3.com launched its service, the five major labels, headed
7096 by the RIAA, brought a lawsuit against MP3.com. MP3.com settled with four of
7097 the five. Nine months later, a federal judge found MP3.com to have been
7098 guilty of willful infringement with respect to the fifth. Applying the law
7099 as it is, the judge imposed a fine against MP3.com of $
118 million. MP3.com
7100 then settled with the remaining plaintiff, Vivendi Universal, paying over
7101 $
54 million. Vivendi purchased MP3.com just about a year later.
7103 Den delen av historien har jeg fortalt før. Nå kommer konklusjonen.
7105 After Vivendi purchased MP3.com, Vivendi turned around and filed a
7106 malpractice lawsuit against the lawyers who had advised it that they had a
7107 good faith claim that the service they wanted to offer would be considered
7108 legal under copyright law. This lawsuit alleged that it should have been
7109 obvious that the courts would find this behavior illegal; therefore, this
7110 lawsuit sought to punish any lawyer who had dared to suggest that the law
7111 was less restrictive than the labels demanded.
7114 Den åpenbare hensikten med dette søksmålet (som ble avsluttet med et forlik
7115 for et uspesifisert beløp like etter at saken ikke lenger fikk
7116 pressedekning), var å sende en melding som ikke kan misforstås til advokater
7117 som gir råd til klienter på dette området: Det er ikke bare dine klienter
7118 som får lide hvis innholdsindustrien retter sine våpen mot dem. Det får
7119 også du. Så de av dere som tror loven burde være mindre restriktiv bør
7120 innse at et slikt syn på loven vil koste deg og ditt firma dyrt.
7121 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961315"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961324"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961330"></a><p>
7122 This strategy is not just limited to the lawyers. In April
2003, Universal
7123 and EMI brought a lawsuit against Hummer Winblad, the venture capital firm
7124 (VC) that had funded Napster at a certain stage of its development, its
7125 cofounder ( John Hummer), and general partner (Hank Barry).
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961343" href=
"#ftn.id2961343" class=
"footnote">160</a>]
</sup> The claim here, as well, was that the VC should
7126 have recognized the right of the content industry to control how the
7127 industry should develop. They should be held personally liable for funding a
7128 company whose business turned out to be beyond the law. Here again, the aim
7129 of the lawsuit is transparent: Any VC now recognizes that if you fund a
7130 company whose business is not approved of by the dinosaurs, you are at risk
7131 not just in the marketplace, but in the courtroom as well. Your investment
7132 buys you not only a company, it also buys you a lawsuit. So extreme has the
7133 environment become that even car manufacturers are afraid of technologies
7134 that touch content. In an article in
<em class=
"citetitle">Business
2.0</em>,
7135 Rafe Needleman describes a discussion with BMW:
7136 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961386"></a><p>
7137 I asked why, with all the storage capacity and computer power in the car,
7138 there was no way to play MP3 files. I was told that BMW engineers in Germany
7139 had rigged a new vehicle to play MP3s via the car's built-in sound system,
7140 but that the company's marketing and legal departments weren't comfortable
7141 with pushing this forward for release stateside. Even today, no new cars are
7142 sold in the United States with bona fide MP3 players. . . .
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961402" href=
"#ftn.id2961402" class=
"footnote">161</a>]
</sup>
7143 </p></blockquote></div><p>
7144 Dette er verden til mafiaen
—fylt med "penger eller livet"-trusler, som
7145 ikke er regulert av domstolene men av trusler som loven gir
7146 rettighetsinnehaver mulighet til å komme med. Det er et system som åpenbart
7147 og nødvendigvis vil kvele ny innovasjon. Det er vanskelig nok å starte et
7148 selskap. Det blir helt umulig hvis selskapet er stadig truet av søksmål.
7153 The point is not that businesses should have a right to start illegal
7154 enterprises. The point is the definition of "illegal." The law is a mess of
7155 uncertainty. We have no good way to know how it should apply to new
7156 technologies. Yet by reversing our tradition of judicial deference, and by
7157 embracing the astonishingly high penalties that copyright law imposes, that
7158 uncertainty now yields a reality which is far more conservative than is
7159 right. If the law imposed the death penalty for parking tickets, we'd not
7160 only have fewer parking tickets, we'd also have much less driving. The same
7161 principle applies to innovation. If innovation is constantly checked by this
7162 uncertain and unlimited liability, we will have much less vibrant innovation
7163 and much less creativity.
7165 The point is directly parallel to the crunchy-lefty point about fair
7166 use. Whatever the "real" law is, realism about the effect of law in both
7167 contexts is the same. This wildly punitive system of regulation will
7168 systematically stifle creativity and innovation. It will protect some
7169 industries and some creators, but it will harm industry and creativity
7170 generally. Free market and free culture depend upon vibrant competition.
7171 Yet the effect of the law today is to stifle just this kind of competition.
7172 The effect is to produce an overregulated culture, just as the effect of too
7173 much control in the market is to produce an overregulatedregulated market.
7176 The building of a permission culture, rather than a free culture, is the
7177 first important way in which the changes I have described will burden
7178 innovation. A permission culture means a lawyer's culture
—a culture in
7179 which the ability to create requires a call to your lawyer. Again, I am not
7180 antilawyer, at least when they're kept in their proper place. I am certainly
7181 not antilaw. But our profession has lost the sense of its limits. And
7182 leaders in our profession have lost an appreciation of the high costs that
7183 our profession imposes upon others. The inefficiency of the law is an
7184 embarrassment to our tradition. And while I believe our profession should
7185 therefore do everything it can to make the law more efficient, it should at
7186 least do everything it can to limit the reach of the law where the law is
7187 not doing any good. The transaction costs buried within a permission culture
7188 are enough to bury a wide range of creativity. Someone needs to do a lot of
7189 justifying to justify that result. The uncertainty of the law is one burden
7190 on innovation. There is a second burden that operates more directly. This is
7191 the effort by many in the content industry to use the law to directly
7192 regulate the technology of the Internet so that it better protects their
7195 The motivation for this response is obvious. The Internet enables the
7196 efficient spread of content. That efficiency is a feature of the Internet's
7197 design. But from the perspective of the content industry, this feature is a
7198 "bug." The efficient spread of content means that content distributors have
7199 a harder time controlling the distribution of content. One obvious response
7200 to this efficiency is thus to make the Internet less efficient. If the
7201 Internet enables "piracy," then, this response says, we should break the
7202 kneecaps of the Internet.
7204 The examples of this form of legislation are many. At the urging of the
7205 content industry, some in Congress have threatened legislation that would
7206 require computers to determine whether the content they access is protected
7207 or not, and to disable the spread of protected content.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961525" href=
"#ftn.id2961525" class=
"footnote">162</a>]
</sup> Congress has already launched proceedings to
7208 explore a mandatory "broadcast flag" that would be required on any device
7209 capable of transmitting digital video (i.e., a computer), and that would
7210 disable the copying of any content that is marked with a broadcast
7211 flag. Other members of Congress have proposed immunizing content providers
7212 from liability for technology they might deploy that would hunt down
7213 copyright violators and disable their machines.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961547" href=
"#ftn.id2961547" class=
"footnote">163</a>]
</sup>
7217 In one sense, these solutions seem sensible. If the problem is the code, why
7218 not regulate the code to remove the problem. But any regulation of technical
7219 infrastructure will always be tuned to the particular technology of the
7220 day. It will impose significant burdens and costs on the technology, but
7221 will likely be eclipsed by advances around exactly those requirements.
7223 In March
2002, a broad coalition of technology companies, led by Intel,
7224 tried to get Congress to see the harm that such legislation would
7225 impose.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961571" href=
"#ftn.id2961571" class=
"footnote">164</a>]
</sup> Their argument was obviously
7226 not that copyright should not be protected. Instead, they argued, any
7227 protection should not do more harm than good.
7229 There is one more obvious way in which this war has harmed
7230 innovation
—again, a story that will be quite familiar to the free
7233 Copyright may be property, but like all property, it is also a form of
7234 regulation. It is a regulation that benefits some and harms others. When
7235 done right, it benefits creators and harms leeches. When done wrong, it is
7236 regulation the powerful use to defeat competitors.
7238 As I described in chapter
10, despite this feature of copyright as
7239 regulation, and subject to important qualifications outlined by Jessica
7240 Litman in her book
<em class=
"citetitle">Digital Copyright
</em>,
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961605" href=
"#ftn.id2961605" class=
"footnote">165</a>]
</sup> overall this history of copyright is not bad. As
7241 chapter
10 details, when new technologies have come along, Congress has
7242 struck a balance to assure that the new is protected from the
7243 old. Compulsory, or statutory, licenses have been one part of that
7244 strategy. Free use (as in the case of the VCR) has been another.
7246 But that pattern of deference to new technologies has now changed with the
7247 rise of the Internet. Rather than striking a balance between the claims of a
7248 new technology and the legitimate rights of content creators, both the
7249 courts and Congress have imposed legal restrictions that will have the
7250 effect of smothering the new to benefit the old.
7252 The response by the courts has been fairly universal.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961640" href=
"#ftn.id2961640" class=
"footnote">166</a>]
</sup> It has been mirrored in the responses threatened
7253 and actually implemented by Congress. I won't catalog all of those responses
7254 here.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961676" href=
"#ftn.id2961676" class=
"footnote">167</a>]
</sup> But there is one example that
7255 captures the flavor of them all. This is the story of the demise of Internet
7261 As I described in chapter
4, when a radio station plays a song, the
7262 recording artist doesn't get paid for that "radio performance" unless he or
7263 she is also the composer. So, for example if Marilyn Monroe had recorded a
7264 version of "Happy Birthday"
—to memorialize her famous performance
7265 before President Kennedy at Madison Square Garden
— then whenever that
7266 recording was played on the radio, the current copyright owners of "Happy
7267 Birthday" would get some money, whereas Marilyn Monroe would not.
7269 The reasoning behind this balance struck by Congress makes some sense. The
7270 justification was that radio was a kind of advertising. The recording artist
7271 thus benefited because by playing her music, the radio station was making it
7272 more likely that her records would be purchased. Thus, the recording artist
7273 got something, even if only indirectly. Probably this reasoning had less to
7274 do with the result than with the power of radio stations: Their lobbyists
7275 were quite good at stopping any efforts to get Congress to require
7276 compensation to the recording artists.
7278 Enter Internet radio. Like regular radio, Internet radio is a technology to
7279 stream content from a broadcaster to a listener. The broadcast travels
7280 across the Internet, not across the ether of radio spectrum. Thus, I can
7281 "tune in" to an Internet radio station in Berlin while sitting in San
7282 Francisco, even though there's no way for me to tune in to a regular radio
7283 station much beyond the San Francisco metropolitan area.
7285 This feature of the architecture of Internet radio means that there are
7286 potentially an unlimited number of radio stations that a user could tune in
7287 to using her computer, whereas under the existing architecture for broadcast
7288 radio, there is an obvious limit to the number of broadcasters and clear
7289 broadcast frequencies. Internet radio could therefore be more competitive
7290 than regular radio; it could provide a wider range of selections. And
7291 because the potential audience for Internet radio is the whole world, niche
7292 stations could easily develop and market their content to a relatively large
7293 number of users worldwide. According to some estimates, more than eighty
7294 million users worldwide have tuned in to this new form of radio.
7299 Internet radio is thus to radio what FM was to AM. It is an improvement
7300 potentially vastly more significant than the FM improvement over AM, since
7301 not only is the technology better, so, too, is the competition. Indeed,
7302 there is a direct parallel between the fight to establish FM radio and the
7303 fight to protect Internet radio. As one author describes Howard Armstrong's
7304 struggle to enable FM radio,
7305 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
7306 An almost unlimited number of FM stations was possible in the shortwaves,
7307 thus ending the unnatural restrictions imposed on radio in the crowded
7308 longwaves. If FM were freely developed, the number of stations would be
7309 limited only by economics and competition rather than by technical
7310 restrictions. . . . Armstrong likened the situation that had grown up in
7311 radio to that following the invention of the printing press, when
7312 governments and ruling interests attempted to control this new instrument of
7313 mass communications by imposing restrictive licenses on it. This tyranny was
7314 broken only when it became possible for men freely to acquire printing
7315 presses and freely to run them. FM in this sense was as great an invention
7316 as the printing presses, for it gave radio the opportunity to strike off its
7317 shackles.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961802" href=
"#ftn.id2961802" class=
"footnote">168</a>]
</sup>
7318 </p></blockquote></div><p>
7319 This potential for FM radio was never realized
—not because Armstrong
7320 was wrong about the technology, but because he underestimated the power of
7321 "vested interests, habits, customs and legislation"
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961586" href=
"#ftn.id2961586" class=
"footnote">169</a>]
</sup> to retard the growth of this competing technology.
7323 Now the very same claim could be made about Internet radio. For again, there
7324 is no technical limitation that could restrict the number of Internet radio
7325 stations. The only restrictions on Internet radio are those imposed by the
7326 law. Copyright law is one such law. So the first question we should ask is,
7327 what copyright rules would govern Internet radio?
7330 But here the power of the lobbyists is reversed. Internet radio is a new
7331 industry. The recording artists, on the other hand, have a very powerful
7332 lobby, the RIAA. Thus when Congress considered the phenomenon of Internet
7333 radio in
1995, the lobbyists had primed Congress to adopt a different rule
7334 for Internet radio than the rule that applies to terrestrial radio. While
7335 terrestrial radio does not have to pay our hypothetical Marilyn Monroe when
7336 it plays her hypothetical recording of "Happy Birthday" on the air,
7337 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>Internet radio does
</em></span>. Not only is the law not neutral
7338 toward Internet radio
—the law actually burdens Internet radio more
7339 than it burdens terrestrial radio.
7341 This financial burden is not slight. As Harvard law professor William Fisher
7342 estimates, if an Internet radio station distributed adfree popular music to
7343 (on average) ten thousand listeners, twenty-four hours a day, the total
7344 artist fees that radio station would owe would be over $
1 million a
7345 year.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961862" href=
"#ftn.id2961862" class=
"footnote">170</a>]
</sup> A regular radio station
7346 broadcasting the same content would pay no equivalent fee.
7348 The burden is not financial only. Under the original rules that were
7349 proposed, an Internet radio station (but not a terrestrial radio station)
7350 would have to collect the following data from
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>every listening
7351 transaction
</em></span>:
7352 </p><div class=
"orderedlist"><ol class=
"orderedlist" type=
"1"><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7353 name of the service;
7354 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7355 channel of the program (AM/FM stations use station ID);
7356 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7357 type of program (archived/looped/live);
7358 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7359 date of transmission;
7360 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7361 time of transmission;
7362 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7363 time zone of origination of transmission;
7364 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7365 numeric designation of the place of the sound recording within the program;
7366 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7367 duration of transmission (to nearest second);
7368 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7369 sound recording title;
7370 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7371 ISRC code of the recording;
7372 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7373 release year of the album per copyright notice and in the case of
7374 compilation albums, the release year of the album and copy- right date of
7376 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7377 featured recording artist;
7378 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7380 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7382 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7383 UPC code of the retail album;
7384 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7386 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7387 copyright owner information;
7388 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7389 musical genre of the channel or program (station format);
7390 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7391 name of the service or entity;
7392 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7394 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7395 date and time that the user logged in (in the user's time zone);
7396 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7397 date and time that the user logged out (in the user's time zone);
7398 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7399 time zone where the signal was received (user);
7400 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7401 Unique User identifier;
7402 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
7403 the country in which the user received the transmissions.
7404 </p></li></ol></div><p>
7405 The Librarian of Congress eventually suspended these reporting requirements,
7406 pending further study. And he also changed the original rates set by the
7407 arbitration panel charged with setting rates. But the basic difference
7408 between Internet radio and terrestrial radio remains: Internet radio has to
7409 pay a
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>type of copyright fee
</em></span> that terrestrial radio does
7412 Why? What justifies this difference? Was there any study of the economic
7413 consequences from Internet radio that would justify these differences? Was
7414 the motive to protect artists against piracy?
7415 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2962073"></a><p>
7416 In a rare bit of candor, one RIAA expert admitted what seemed obvious to
7417 everyone at the time. As Alex Alben, vice president for Public Policy at
7418 Real Networks, told me,
7419 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
7421 The RIAA, which was representing the record labels, presented some testimony
7422 about what they thought a willing buyer would pay to a willing seller, and
7423 it was much higher. It was ten times higher than what radio stations pay to
7424 perform the same songs for the same period of time. And so the attorneys
7425 representing the webcasters asked the RIAA, . . . "How do you come up with a
7426 rate that's so much higher? Why is it worth more than radio? Because here we
7427 have hundreds of thousands of webcasters who want to pay, and that should
7428 establish the market rate, and if you set the rate so high, you're going to
7429 drive the small webcasters out of business. . . ."
7431 And the RIAA experts said, "Well, we don't really model this as an industry
7432 with thousands of webcasters,
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>we think it should be an industry
7433 with, you know, five or seven big players who can pay a high rate and it's a
7434 stable, predictable market
</em></span>." (Emphasis added.)
7435 </p></blockquote></div><p>
7436 Translation: The aim is to use the law to eliminate competition, so that
7437 this platform of potentially immense competition, which would cause the
7438 diversity and range of content available to explode, would not cause pain to
7439 the dinosaurs of old. There is no one, on either the right or the left, who
7440 should endorse this use of the law. And yet there is practically no one, on
7441 either the right or the left, who is doing anything effective to prevent it.
7442 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Corrupting Citizens"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"corruptingcitizens"></a>Corrupting Citizens
</h2></div></div></div><p>
7443 Overregulation stifles creativity. It smothers innovation. It gives
7444 dinosaurs a veto over the future. It wastes the extraordinary opportunity
7445 for a democratic creativity that digital technology enables.
7447 In addition to these important harms, there is one more that was important
7448 to our forebears, but seems forgotten today. Overregulation corrupts
7449 citizens and weakens the rule of law.
7452 The war that is being waged today is a war of prohibition. As with every war
7453 of prohibition, it is targeted against the behavior of a very large number
7454 of citizens. According to
<em class=
"citetitle">The New York Times
</em>,
43
7455 million Americans downloaded music in May
2002.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2962160" href=
"#ftn.id2962160" class=
"footnote">171</a>]
</sup> According to the RIAA, the behavior of those
43 million Americans
7456 is a felony. We thus have a set of rules that transform
20 percent of
7457 America into criminals. As the RIAA launches lawsuits against not only the
7458 Napsters and Kazaas of the world, but against students building search
7459 engines, and increasingly against ordinary users downloading content, the
7460 technologies for sharing will advance to further protect and hide illegal
7461 use. It is an arms race or a civil war, with the extremes of one side
7462 inviting a more extreme response by the other.
7464 The content industry's tactics exploit the failings of the American legal
7465 system. When the RIAA brought suit against Jesse Jordan, it knew that in
7466 Jordan it had found a scapegoat, not a defendant. The threat of having to
7467 pay either all the money in the world in damages ($
15,
000,
000) or almost all
7468 the money in the world to defend against paying all the money in the world
7469 in damages ($
250,
000 in legal fees) led Jordan to choose to pay all the
7470 money he had in the world ($
12,
000) to make the suit go away. The same
7471 strategy animates the RIAA's suits against individual users. In September
7472 2003, the RIAA sued
261 individuals
—including a twelve-year-old girl
7473 living in public housing and a seventy-year-old man who had no idea what
7474 file sharing was.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2961852" href=
"#ftn.id2961852" class=
"footnote">172</a>]
</sup> As these scapegoats
7475 discovered, it will always cost more to defend against these suits than it
7476 would cost to simply settle. (The twelve year old, for example, like Jesse
7477 Jordan, paid her life savings of $
2,
000 to settle the case.) Our law is an
7478 awful system for defending rights. It is an embarrassment to our
7479 tradition. And the consequence of our law as it is, is that those with the
7480 power can use the law to quash any rights they oppose.
7482 Wars of prohibition are nothing new in America. This one is just something
7483 more extreme than anything we've seen before. We experimented with alcohol
7484 prohibition, at a time when the per capita consumption of alcohol was
1.5
7485 gallons per capita per year. The war against drinking initially reduced that
7486 consumption to just
30 percent of its preprohibition levels, but by the end
7487 of prohibition, consumption was up to
70 percent of the preprohibition
7488 level. Americans were drinking just about as much, but now, a vast number
7489 were criminals.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2962235" href=
"#ftn.id2962235" class=
"footnote">173</a>]
</sup> We have launched a war
7490 on drugs aimed at reducing the consumption of regulated narcotics that
7
7491 percent (or
16 million) Americans now use.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2962248" href=
"#ftn.id2962248" class=
"footnote">174</a>]
</sup> That is a drop from the high (so to speak) in
1979 of
14 percent of
7492 the population. We regulate automobiles to the point where the vast majority
7493 of Americans violate the law every day. We run such a complex tax system
7494 that a majority of cash businesses regularly cheat.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2962265" href=
"#ftn.id2962265" class=
"footnote">175</a>]
</sup> We pride ourselves on our "free society," but an
7495 endless array of ordinary behavior is regulated within our society. And as a
7496 result, a huge proportion of Americans regularly violate at least some law.
7498 This state of affairs is not without consequence. It is a particularly
7499 salient issue for teachers like me, whose job it is to teach law students
7500 about the importance of "ethics." As my colleague Charlie Nesson told a
7501 class at Stanford, each year law schools admit thousands of students who
7502 have illegally downloaded music, illegally consumed alcohol and sometimes
7503 drugs, illegally worked without paying taxes, illegally driven cars. These
7504 are kids for whom behaving illegally is increasingly the norm. And then we,
7505 as law professors, are supposed to teach them how to behave
7506 ethically
—how to say no to bribes, or keep client funds separate, or
7507 honor a demand to disclose a document that will mean that your case is
7508 over. Generations of Americans
—more significantly in some parts of
7509 America than in others, but still, everywhere in America today
—can't
7510 live their lives both normally and legally, since "normally" entails a
7511 certain degree of illegality.
7513 The response to this general illegality is either to enforce the law more
7514 severely or to change the law. We, as a society, have to learn how to make
7515 that choice more rationally. Whether a law makes sense depends, in part, at
7516 least, upon whether the costs of the law, both intended and collateral,
7517 outweigh the benefits. If the costs, intended and collateral, do outweigh
7518 the benefits, then the law ought to be changed. Alternatively, if the costs
7519 of the existing system are much greater than the costs of an alternative,
7520 then we have a good reason to consider the alternative.
7525 My point is not the idiotic one: Just because people violate a law, we
7526 should therefore repeal it. Obviously, we could reduce murder statistics
7527 dramatically by legalizing murder on Wednesdays and Fridays. But that
7528 wouldn't make any sense, since murder is wrong every day of the week. A
7529 society is right to ban murder always and everywhere.
7531 My point is instead one that democracies understood for generations, but
7532 that we recently have learned to forget. The rule of law depends upon people
7533 obeying the law. The more often, and more repeatedly, we as citizens
7534 experience violating the law, the less we respect the law. Obviously, in
7535 most cases, the important issue is the law, not respect for the law. I don't
7536 care whether the rapist respects the law or not; I want to catch and
7537 incarcerate the rapist. But I do care whether my students respect the
7538 law. And I do care if the rules of law sow increasing disrespect because of
7539 the extreme of regulation they impose. Twenty million Americans have come
7540 of age since the Internet introduced this different idea of "sharing." We
7541 need to be able to call these twenty million Americans "citizens," not
7544 When at least forty-three million citizens download content from the
7545 Internet, and when they use tools to combine that content in ways
7546 unauthorized by copyright holders, the first question we should be asking is
7547 not how best to involve the FBI. The first question should be whether this
7548 particular prohibition is really necessary in order to achieve the proper
7549 ends that copyright law serves. Is there another way to assure that artists
7550 get paid without transforming forty-three million Americans into felons?
7551 Does it make sense if there are other ways to assure that artists get paid
7552 without transforming America into a nation of felons?
7554 This abstract point can be made more clear with a particular example.
7557 We all own CDs. Many of us still own phonograph records. These pieces of
7558 plastic encode music that in a certain sense we have bought. The law
7559 protects our right to buy and sell that plastic: It is not a copyright
7560 infringement for me to sell all my classical records at a used record store
7561 and buy jazz records to replace them. That "use" of the recordings is free.
7563 But as the MP3 craze has demonstrated, there is another use of phonograph
7564 records that is effectively free. Because these recordings were made without
7565 copy-protection technologies, I am "free" to copy, or "rip," music from my
7566 records onto a computer hard disk. Indeed, Apple Corporation went so far as
7567 to suggest that "freedom" was a right: In a series of commercials, Apple
7568 endorsed the "Rip, Mix, Burn" capacities of digital technologies.
7569 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2962398"></a><p>
7570 This "use" of my records is certainly valuable. I have begun a large process
7571 at home of ripping all of my and my wife's CDs, and storing them in one
7572 archive. Then, using Apple's iTunes, or a wonderful program called
7573 Andromeda, we can build different play lists of our music: Bach, Baroque,
7574 Love Songs, Love Songs of Significant Others
—the potential is
7575 endless. And by reducing the costs of mixing play lists, these technologies
7576 help build a creativity with play lists that is itself independently
7577 valuable. Compilations of songs are creative and meaningful in their own
7580 This use is enabled by unprotected media
—either CDs or records. But
7581 unprotected media also enable file sharing. File sharing threatens (or so
7582 the content industry believes) the ability of creators to earn a fair return
7583 from their creativity. And thus, many are beginning to experiment with
7584 technologies to eliminate unprotected media. These technologies, for
7585 example, would enable CDs that could not be ripped. Or they might enable spy
7586 programs to identify ripped content on people's machines.
7589 If these technologies took off, then the building of large archives of your
7590 own music would become quite difficult. You might hang in hacker circles,
7591 and get technology to disable the technologies that protect the
7592 content. Trading in those technologies is illegal, but maybe that doesn't
7593 bother you much. In any case, for the vast majority of people, these
7594 protection technologies would effectively destroy the archiving use of
7595 CDs. The technology, in other words, would force us all back to the world
7596 where we either listened to music by manipulating pieces of plastic or were
7597 part of a massively complex "digital rights management" system.
7599 If the only way to assure that artists get paid were the elimination of the
7600 ability to freely move content, then these technologies to interfere with
7601 the freedom to move content would be justifiable. But what if there were
7602 another way to assure that artists are paid, without locking down any
7603 content? What if, in other words, a different system could assure
7604 compensation to artists while also preserving the freedom to move content
7607 My point just now is not to prove that there is such a system. I offer a
7608 version of such a system in the last chapter of this book. For now, the only
7609 point is the relatively uncontroversial one: If a different system achieved
7610 the same legitimate objectives that the existing copyright system achieved,
7611 but left consumers and creators much more free, then we'd have a very good
7612 reason to pursue this alternative
—namely, freedom. The choice, in
7613 other words, would not be between property and piracy; the choice would be
7614 between different property systems and the freedoms each allowed.
7616 I believe there is a way to assure that artists are paid without turning
7617 forty-three million Americans into felons. But the salient feature of this
7618 alternative is that it would lead to a very different market for producing
7619 and distributing creativity. The dominant few, who today control the vast
7620 majority of the distribution of content in the world, would no longer
7621 exercise this extreme of control. Rather, they would go the way of the
7624 Except that this generation's buggy manufacturers have already saddled
7625 Congress, and are riding the law to protect themselves against this new form
7626 of competition. For them the choice is between fortythree million Americans
7627 as criminals and their own survival.
7629 It is understandable why they choose as they do. It is not understandable
7630 why we as a democracy continue to choose as we do. Jack Valenti is charming;
7631 but not so charming as to justify giving up a tradition as deep and
7632 important as our tradition of free culture. There's one more aspect to this
7633 corruption that is particularly important to civil liberties, and follows
7634 directly from any war of prohibition. As Electronic Frontier Foundation
7635 attorney Fred von Lohmann describes, this is the "collateral damage" that
7636 "arises whenever you turn a very large percentage of the population into
7637 criminals." This is the collateral damage to civil liberties generally.
7638 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2962503"></a>
7640 "Hvis du kan behandle noen som en antatt lovbryter," forklarer von Lohmann,
7641 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2962516"></a>
7642 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
7643 then all of a sudden a lot of basic civil liberty protections evaporate to
7644 one degree or another. . . . If you're a copyright infringer, how can you
7645 hope to have any privacy rights? If you're a copyright infringer, how can
7646 you hope to be secure against seizures of your computer? How can you hope to
7647 continue to receive Internet access? . . . Our sensibilities change as soon
7648 as we think, "Oh, well, but that person's a criminal, a lawbreaker." Well,
7649 what this campaign against file sharing has done is turn a remarkable
7650 percentage of the American Internet-using population into "lawbreakers."
7651 </p></blockquote></div><p>
7652 And the consequence of this transformation of the American public into
7653 criminals is that it becomes trivial, as a matter of due process, to
7654 effectively erase much of the privacy most would presume.
7656 Users of the Internet began to see this generally in
2003 as the RIAA
7657 launched its campaign to force Internet service providers to turn over the
7658 names of customers who the RIAA believed were violating copyright
7659 law. Verizon fought that demand and lost. With a simple request to a judge,
7660 and without any notice to the customer at all, the identity of an Internet
7664 The RIAA then expanded this campaign, by announcing a general strategy to
7665 sue individual users of the Internet who are alleged to have downloaded
7666 copyrighted music from file-sharing systems. But as we've seen, the
7667 potential damages from these suits are astronomical: If a family's computer
7668 is used to download a single CD's worth of music, the family could be liable
7669 for $
2 million in damages. That didn't stop the RIAA from suing a number of
7670 these families, just as they had sued Jesse Jordan.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2962567" href=
"#ftn.id2962567" class=
"footnote">176</a>]
</sup>
7673 Even this understates the espionage that is being waged by the RIAA. A
7674 report from CNN late last summer described a strategy the RIAA had adopted
7675 to track Napster users.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2962608" href=
"#ftn.id2962608" class=
"footnote">177</a>]
</sup> Using a
7676 sophisticated hashing algorithm, the RIAA took what is in effect a
7677 fingerprint of every song in the Napster catalog. Any copy of one of those
7678 MP3s will have the same "fingerprint."
7680 So imagine the following not-implausible scenario: Imagine a friend gives a
7681 CD to your daughter
—a collection of songs just like the cassettes you
7682 used to make as a kid. You don't know, and neither does your daughter, where
7683 these songs came from. But she copies these songs onto her computer. She
7684 then takes her computer to college and connects it to a college network, and
7685 if the college network is "cooperating" with the RIAA's espionage, and she
7686 hasn't properly protected her content from the network (do you know how to
7687 do that yourself ?), then the RIAA will be able to identify your daughter as
7688 a "criminal." And under the rules that universities are beginning to
7689 deploy,
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2962466" href=
"#ftn.id2962466" class=
"footnote">178</a>]
</sup> your daughter can lose the
7690 right to use the university's computer network. She can, in some cases, be
7693 Now, of course, she'll have the right to defend herself. You can hire a
7694 lawyer for her (at $
300 per hour, if you're lucky), and she can plead that
7695 she didn't know anything about the source of the songs or that they came
7696 from Napster. And it may well be that the university believes her. But the
7697 university might not believe her. It might treat this "contraband" as
7698 presumptive of guilt. And as any number of college students have already
7699 learned, our presumptions about innocence disappear in the middle of wars of
7700 prohibition. This war is no different. Says von Lohmann,
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2962703"></a>
7701 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
7702 So when we're talking about numbers like forty to sixty million Americans
7703 that are essentially copyright infringers, you create a situation where the
7704 civil liberties of those people are very much in peril in a general
7705 matter. [I don't] think [there is any] analog where you could randomly
7706 choose any person off the street and be confident that they were committing
7707 an unlawful act that could put them on the hook for potential felony
7708 liability or hundreds of millions of dollars of civil liability. Certainly
7709 we all speed, but speeding isn't the kind of an act for which we routinely
7710 forfeit civil liberties. Some people use drugs, and I think that's the
7711 closest analog, [but] many have noted that the war against drugs has eroded
7712 all of our civil liberties because it's treated so many Americans as
7713 criminals. Well, I think it's fair to say that file sharing is an order of
7714 magnitude larger number of Americans than drug use. . . . If forty to sixty
7715 million Americans have become lawbreakers, then we're really on a slippery
7716 slope to lose a lot of civil liberties for all forty to sixty million of
7718 </p></blockquote></div><p>
7719 When forty to sixty million Americans are considered "criminals" under the
7720 law, and when the law could achieve the same objective
— securing
7721 rights to authors
—without these millions being considered "criminals,"
7722 who is the villain? Americans or the law? Which is American, a constant war
7723 on our own people or a concerted effort through our democracy to change our
7725 </p></div><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2960894" href=
"#id2960894" class=
"para">157</a>]
</sup>
7727 See Lynne W. Jeter,
<em class=
"citetitle">Disconnected: Deceit and Betrayal at
7728 WorldCom
</em> (Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley
& Sons,
2003),
176,
204;
7729 for details of the settlement, see MCI press release, "MCI Wins
7730 U.S. District Court Approval for SEC Settlement" (
7 July
2003), available at
7731 <a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
37</a>.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960917"></a>
7732 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2960930" href=
"#id2960930" class=
"para">158</a>]
</sup>
7733 The bill, modeled after California's tort reform model, was passed in the
7734 House of Representatives but defeated in a Senate vote in July
2003. For an
7735 overview, see Tanya Albert, "Measure Stalls in Senate: `We'll Be Back,' Say
7736 Tort Reformers," amednews.com,
28 July
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
38</a>, and "Senate Turns Back
7737 Malpractice Caps," CBSNews.com,
9 July
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
39</a>. President Bush has
7738 continued to urge tort reform in recent months.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2960954"></a>
7739 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2960533" href=
"#id2960533" class=
"para">159</a>]
</sup>
7743 See Danit Lidor, "Artists Just Wanna Be Free,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Wired
</em>,
7744 7 July
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
7745 #
40</a>. For an overview of the exhibition, see
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
41</a>.
7746 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961343" href=
"#id2961343" class=
"para">160</a>]
</sup>
7749 See Joseph Menn, "Universal, EMI Sue Napster Investor,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Los
7750 Angeles Times
</em>,
23 April
2003. For a parallel argument about the
7751 effects on innovation in the distribution of music, see Janelle Brown, "The
7752 Music Revolution Will Not Be Digitized," Salon.com,
1 June
2001, available
7753 at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
42</a>. See also
7754 Jon Healey, "Online Music Services Besieged,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Los Angeles
7755 Times
</em>,
28 May
2001.
7756 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961402" href=
"#id2961402" class=
"para">161</a>]
</sup>
7758 Rafe Needleman, "Driving in Cars with MP3s,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Business
7759 2.0</em>,
16 June
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
43</a>. I am grateful to
7760 Dr. Mohammad Al-Ubaydli for this example.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961418"></a>
7761 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961525" href=
"#id2961525" class=
"para">162</a>]
</sup>
7763 "Copyright and Digital Media in a Post-Napster World," GartnerG2 and the
7764 Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School (
2003),
7765 33–35, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
7767 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961547" href=
"#id2961547" class=
"para">163</a>]
</sup>
7769 GartnerG2,
26–27.
7770 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961571" href=
"#id2961571" class=
"para">164</a>]
</sup>
7772 See David McGuire, "Tech Execs Square Off Over Piracy," Newsbytes, February
7773 2002 (Entertainment).
7774 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961605" href=
"#id2961605" class=
"para">165</a>]
</sup>
7775 Jessica Litman,
<em class=
"citetitle">Digital Copyright
</em> (Amherst, N.Y.:
7776 Prometheus Books,
2001).
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961612"></a>
7777 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961640" href=
"#id2961640" class=
"para">166</a>]
</sup>
7780 The only circuit court exception is found in
<em class=
"citetitle">Recording Industry
7781 Association of America (RIAA)
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Diamond Multimedia
7782 Systems
</em>,
180 F.
3d
1072 (
9th Cir.
1999). There the court of
7783 appeals for the Ninth Circuit reasoned that makers of a portable MP3 player
7784 were not liable for contributory copyright infringement for a device that is
7785 unable to record or redistribute music (a device whose only copying function
7786 is to render portable a music file already stored on a user's hard drive).
7787 At the district court level, the only exception is found in
7788 <em class=
"citetitle">Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios,
7789 Inc
</em>. v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Grokster, Ltd
</em>.,
259 F. Supp.
2d
7790 1029 (C.D. Cal.,
2003), where the court found the link between the
7791 distributor and any given user's conduct too attenuated to make the
7792 distributor liable for contributory or vicarious infringement liability.
7793 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961676" href=
"#id2961676" class=
"para">167</a>]
</sup>
7795 For example, in July
2002, Representative Howard Berman introduced the
7796 Peer-to-Peer Piracy Prevention Act (H.R.
5211), which would immunize
7797 copyright holders from liability for damage done to computers when the
7798 copyright holders use technology to stop copyright infringement. In August
7799 2002, Representative Billy Tauzin introduced a bill to mandate that
7800 technologies capable of rebroadcasting digital copies of films broadcast on
7801 TV (i.e., computers) respect a "broadcast flag" that would disable copying
7802 of that content. And in March of the same year, Senator Fritz Hollings
7803 introduced the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act,
7804 which mandated copyright protection technology in all digital media
7805 devices. See GartnerG2, "Copyright and Digital Media in a Post-Napster
7806 World,"
27 June
2003,
33–34, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
44</a>.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961684"></a>
7807 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961802" href=
"#id2961802" class=
"para">168</a>]
</sup>
7811 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961586" href=
"#id2961586" class=
"para">169</a>]
</sup>
7815 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961862" href=
"#id2961862" class=
"para">170</a>]
</sup>
7817 This example was derived from fees set by the original Copyright Arbitration
7818 Royalty Panel (CARP) proceedings, and is drawn from an example offered by
7819 Professor William Fisher. Conference Proceedings, iLaw (Stanford),
3 July
7820 2003, on file with author. Professors Fisher and Zittrain submitted
7821 testimony in the CARP proceeding that was ultimately rejected. See Jonathan
7822 Zittrain, Digital Performance Right in Sound Recordings and Ephemeral
7823 Recordings, Docket No.
2000-
9, CARP DTRA
1 and
2, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
45</a>. For an excellent
7824 analysis making a similar point, see Randal C. Picker, "Copyright as Entry
7825 Policy: The Case of Digital Distribution,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Antitrust
7826 Bulletin
</em> (Summer/Fall
2002):
461: "This was not confusion, these
7827 are just old-fashioned entry barriers. Analog radio stations are protected
7828 from digital entrants, reducing entry in radio and diversity. Yes, this is
7829 done in the name of getting royalties to copyright holders, but, absent the
7830 play of powerful interests, that could have been done in a media-neutral
7831 way."
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961891"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2961900"></a>
7832 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2962160" href=
"#id2962160" class=
"para">171</a>]
</sup>
7834 Mike Graziano and Lee Rainie, "The Music Downloading Deluge," Pew Internet
7835 and American Life Project (
24 April
2001), available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
46</a>. The Pew Internet and
7836 American Life Project reported that
37 million Americans had downloaded
7837 music files from the Internet by early
2001.
7838 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2961852" href=
"#id2961852" class=
"para">172</a>]
</sup>
7841 Alex Pham, "The Labels Strike Back: N.Y. Girl Settles RIAA Case,"
7842 <em class=
"citetitle">Los Angeles Times
</em>,
10 September
2003, Business.
7843 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2962235" href=
"#id2962235" class=
"para">173</a>]
</sup>
7846 Jeffrey A. Miron and Jeffrey Zwiebel, "Alcohol Consumption During
7847 Prohibition,"
<em class=
"citetitle">American Economic Review
</em> 81, no.
2
7849 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2962248" href=
"#id2962248" class=
"para">174</a>]
</sup>
7852 National Drug Control Policy: Hearing Before the House Government Reform
7853 Committee,
108th Cong.,
1st sess. (
5 March
2003) (statement of John
7854 P. Walters, director of National Drug Control Policy).
7855 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2962265" href=
"#id2962265" class=
"para">175</a>]
</sup>
7858 See James Andreoni, Brian Erard, and Jonathon Feinstein, "Tax Compliance,"
7859 <em class=
"citetitle">Journal of Economic Literature
</em> 36 (
1998):
818 (survey
7860 of compliance literature).
7861 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2962567" href=
"#id2962567" class=
"para">176</a>]
</sup>
7864 See Frank Ahrens, "RIAA's Lawsuits Meet Surprised Targets; Single Mother in
7865 Calif.,
12-Year-Old Girl in N.Y. Among Defendants,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Washington
7866 Post
</em>,
10 September
2003, E1; Chris Cobbs, "Worried Parents Pull
7867 Plug on File `Stealing'; With the Music Industry Cracking Down on File
7868 Swapping, Parents are Yanking Software from Home PCs to Avoid Being Sued,"
7869 <em class=
"citetitle">Orlando Sentinel Tribune
</em>,
30 August
2003, C1;
7870 Jefferson Graham, "Recording Industry Sues Parents,"
<em class=
"citetitle">USA
7871 Today
</em>,
15 September
2003,
4D; John Schwartz, "She Says She's No
7872 Music Pirate. No Snoop Fan, Either,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New York Times
</em>,
7873 25 September
2003, C1; Margo Varadi, "Is Brianna a Criminal?"
7874 <em class=
"citetitle">Toronto Star
</em>,
18 September
2003, P7.
7875 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2962608" href=
"#id2962608" class=
"para">177</a>]
</sup>
7878 See "Revealed: How RIAA Tracks Downloaders: Music Industry Discloses Some
7879 Methods Used," CNN.com, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
47</a>.
7880 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2962466" href=
"#id2962466" class=
"para">178</a>]
</sup>
7883 See Jeff Adler, "Cambridge: On Campus, Pirates Are Not Penitent,"
7884 <em class=
"citetitle">Boston Globe
</em>,
18 May
2003, City Weekly,
1; Frank
7885 Ahrens, "Four Students Sued over Music Sites; Industry Group Targets File
7886 Sharing at Colleges,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Washington Post
</em>,
4 April
2003,
7887 E1; Elizabeth Armstrong, "Students `Rip, Mix, Burn' at Their Own Risk,"
7888 <em class=
"citetitle">Christian Science Monitor
</em>,
2 September
2003,
20;
7889 Robert Becker and Angela Rozas, "Music Pirate Hunt Turns to Loyola; Two
7890 Students Names Are Handed Over; Lawsuit Possible,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Chicago
7891 Tribune
</em>,
16 July
2003,
1C; Beth Cox, "RIAA Trains Antipiracy
7892 Guns on Universities,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Internet News
</em>,
30 January
7893 2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
7894 #
48</a>; Benny Evangelista, "Download Warning
101: Freshman Orientation
7895 This Fall to Include Record Industry Warnings Against File Sharing,"
7896 <em class=
"citetitle">San Francisco Chronicle
</em>,
11 August
2003, E11; "Raid,
7897 Letters Are Weapons at Universities,"
<em class=
"citetitle">USA Today
</em>,
26
7899 </p></div></div></div></div><div class=
"part" title=
"Del IV. Maktfordeling"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h1 class=
"title"><a name=
"c-balances"></a>Del IV. Maktfordeling
</h1></div></div></div><div class=
"partintro" title=
"Maktfordeling"><div></div><p>
7900 Så her er bildet: Du står på siden av veien. Bilen din er på brann. Du er
7901 sint og opprørt fordi du delvis bidro til å starte brannen. Nå vet du ikke
7902 hvordan du slokker den. Ved siden av deg er en bøtte, fylt med
7903 bensin. Bensin vil åpenbart ikke slukke brannen.
7905 Mens du tenker over situasjonen, kommer noen andre forbi. I panikk griper
7906 hun bøtta, og før du har hatt sjansen til å be henne stoppe
—eller før
7907 hun forstår hvorfor hun bør stoppe
—er bøtten i svevet. Bensinen er på
7908 tur mot den brennende bilen. Og brannen som bensinen kommer til å fyre opp
7909 vil straks sette fyr på alt i omgivelsene.
7911 En krig om opphavsrett pågår over alt
— og vi fokuserer alle på feil
7912 ting. Det er ingen tvil om at dagens teknologier truer eksisterende
7913 virksomheter. Uten tvil kan de true artister. Men teknologier endrer seg.
7914 Industrien og teknologer har en rekke måter å bruke teknologi til å beskytte
7915 dem selv mot dagens trusler på Internet. Dette er en brann som overlatt til
7916 seg selv vil brenne ut.
7920 Likevel er ikke besluttningstagere villig til å la denne brannen i fred.
7921 Ladet med masse penger fra lobbyister er de lystne på å gå i mellom for å
7922 fjerne problemet slik de oppfatter det. Men problemet slik de oppfatter det
7923 er ikke den reelle trusselen som denne kulturen står med ansiktet mot. For
7924 mens vi ser på denne lille brannen i hjørnet er det en massiv endring i
7925 hvordan kultur blir skapt som pågår over alt.
7927 På en eller annen måte må vi klare å snu oppmerksomheten mot dette mer
7928 viktige og fundametale problemet. Vi må finne en måte å unngå å helle
7929 bensin på denne brannen.
7931 Vi har ikke funne denne måten ennå. Istedet synes vi å være fanget i en
7932 enklere og sort-hvit tenkning. Uansett hvor mange folk som presser på for å
7933 gjøre rammen for debatten litt bredere, er det dette enkle sort-hvit-synet
7934 som består. Vi kjører sakte forbi og stirrer på brannen når vi i stedet
7935 burde holde øynene på veien.
7937 Denne utfordringen har vært livet mitt de siste årene. Det har også vært
7938 min falitt. I de to neste kapittlene, beskriver jeg en liten innsats, så
7939 langt uten suksess, på å finne en måte å endre fokus på denne debatten. Vi
7940 må forstå disse mislyktede forsøkene hvis vi skal forstå hva som kreves for
7942 </p><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#eldred">14. Kapittel tretten: Eldred
</a></span></dt><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#eldred-ii">15. Kapittel fjorten: Eldred II
</a></span></dt></dl></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 14. Kapittel tretten: Eldred"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"eldred"></a>Kapittel
14. Kapittel tretten: Eldred
</h2></div></div></div><p>
7943 In
1995, a father was frustrated that his daughters didn't seem to like
7944 Hawthorne. No doubt there was more than one such father, but at least one
7945 did something about it. Eric Eldred, a retired computer programmer living in
7946 New Hampshire, decided to put Hawthorne on the Web. An electronic version,
7947 Eldred thought, with links to pictures and explanatory text, would make this
7948 nineteenth-century author's work come alive.
7950 It didn't work
—at least for his daughters. They didn't find Hawthorne
7951 any more interesting than before. But Eldred's experiment gave birth to a
7952 hobby, and his hobby begat a cause: Eldred would build a library of public
7953 domain works by scanning these works and making them available for free.
7956 Eldred's library was not simply a copy of certain public domain works,
7957 though even a copy would have been of great value to people across the world
7958 who can't get access to printed versions of these works. Instead, Eldred was
7959 producing derivative works from these public domain works. Just as Disney
7960 turned Grimm into stories more accessible to the twentieth century, Eldred
7961 transformed Hawthorne, and many others, into a form more
7962 accessible
—technically accessible
—today.
7964 Eldred's freedom to do this with Hawthorne's work grew from the same source
7965 as Disney's. Hawthorne's
<em class=
"citetitle">Scarlet Letter
</em> had passed
7966 into the public domain in
1907. It was free for anyone to take without the
7967 permission of the Hawthorne estate or anyone else. Some, such as Dover Press
7968 and Penguin Classics, take works from the public domain and produce printed
7969 editions, which they sell in bookstores across the country. Others, such as
7970 Disney, take these stories and turn them into animated cartoons, sometimes
7971 successfully (
<em class=
"citetitle">Cinderella
</em>), sometimes not
7972 (
<em class=
"citetitle">The Hunchback of Notre Dame
</em>,
<em class=
"citetitle">Treasure
7973 Planet
</em>). These are all commercial publications of public domain
7976 The Internet created the possibility of noncommercial publications of public
7977 domain works. Eldred's is just one example. There are literally thousands of
7978 others. Hundreds of thousands from across the world have discovered this
7979 platform of expression and now use it to share works that are, by law, free
7980 for the taking. This has produced what we might call the "noncommercial
7981 publishing industry," which before the Internet was limited to people with
7982 large egos or with political or social causes. But with the Internet, it
7983 includes a wide range of individuals and groups dedicated to spreading
7984 culture generally.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2962945" href=
"#ftn.id2962945" class=
"footnote">179</a>]
</sup>
7986 As I said, Eldred lives in New Hampshire. In
1998, Robert Frost's collection
7987 of poems
<em class=
"citetitle">New Hampshire
</em> was slated to pass into the
7988 public domain. Eldred wanted to post that collection in his free public
7989 library. But Congress got in the way. As I described in chapter
10, in
7990 1998, for the eleventh time in forty years, Congress extended the terms of
7991 existing copyrights
—this time by twenty years. Eldred would not be
7992 free to add any works more recent than
1923 to his collection until
2019.
7993 Indeed, no copyrighted work would pass into the public domain until that
7994 year (and not even then, if Congress extends the term again). By contrast,
7995 in the same period, more than
1 million patents will pass into the public
8000 This was the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA), enacted in
8001 memory of the congressman and former musician Sonny Bono, who, his widow,
8002 Mary Bono, says, believed that "copyrights should be forever."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2962994" href=
"#ftn.id2962994" class=
"footnote">180</a>]
</sup>
8005 Eldred decided to fight this law. He first resolved to fight it through
8006 civil disobedience. In a series of interviews, Eldred announced that he
8007 would publish as planned, CTEA notwithstanding. But because of a second law
8008 passed in
1998, the NET (No Electronic Theft) Act, his act of publishing
8009 would make Eldred a felon
—whether or not anyone complained. This was a
8010 dangerous strategy for a disabled programmer to undertake.
8012 It was here that I became involved in Eldred's battle. I was a
8013 constitutional scholar whose first passion was constitutional
8014 interpretation. And though constitutional law courses never focus upon the
8015 Progress Clause of the Constitution, it had always struck me as importantly
8016 different. As you know, the Constitution says,
8017 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
8018 Congress has the power to promote the Progress of Science . . . by securing
8019 for limited Times to Authors . . . exclusive Right to their
8020 . . . Writings. . . .
8021 </p></blockquote></div><p>
8022 As I've described, this clause is unique within the power-granting clause of
8023 Article I, section
8 of our Constitution. Every other clause granting power
8024 to Congress simply says Congress has the power to do something
—for
8025 example, to regulate "commerce among the several states" or "declare War."
8026 But here, the "something" is something quite specific
—to "promote
8027 . . . Progress"
—through means that are also specific
— by
8028 "securing" "exclusive Rights" (i.e., copyrights) "for limited Times."
8030 In the past forty years, Congress has gotten into the practice of extending
8031 existing terms of copyright protection. What puzzled me about this was, if
8032 Congress has the power to extend existing terms, then the Constitution's
8033 requirement that terms be "limited" will have no practical effect. If every
8034 time a copyright is about to expire, Congress has the power to extend its
8035 term, then Congress can achieve what the Constitution plainly
8036 forbids
—perpetual terms "on the installment plan," as Professor Peter
8037 Jaszi so nicely put it.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2963035"></a>
8039 As an academic, my first response was to hit the books. I remember sitting
8040 late at the office, scouring on-line databases for any serious consideration
8041 of the question. No one had ever challenged Congress's practice of extending
8042 existing terms. That failure may in part be why Congress seemed so
8043 untroubled in its habit. That, and the fact that the practice had become so
8044 lucrative for Congress. Congress knows that copyright owners will be willing
8045 to pay a great deal of money to see their copyright terms extended. And so
8046 Congress is quite happy to keep this gravy train going.
8048 For this is the core of the corruption in our present system of
8049 government. "Corruption" not in the sense that representatives are bribed.
8050 Rather, "corruption" in the sense that the system induces the beneficiaries
8051 of Congress's acts to raise and give money to Congress to induce it to
8052 act. There's only so much time; there's only so much Congress can do. Why
8053 not limit its actions to those things it must do
—and those things that
8054 pay? Extending copyright terms pays.
8056 If that's not obvious to you, consider the following: Say you're one of the
8057 very few lucky copyright owners whose copyright continues to make money one
8058 hundred years after it was created. The Estate of Robert Frost is a good
8059 example. Frost died in
1963. His poetry continues to be extraordinarily
8060 valuable. Thus the Robert Frost estate benefits greatly from any extension
8061 of copyright, since no publisher would pay the estate any money if the poems
8062 Frost wrote could be published by anyone for free.
8064 So imagine the Robert Frost estate is earning $
100,
000 a year from three of
8065 Frost's poems. And imagine the copyright for those poems is about to
8066 expire. You sit on the board of the Robert Frost estate. Your financial
8067 adviser comes to your board meeting with a very grim report:
8070 "Next year," the adviser announces, "our copyrights in works A, B, and C
8071 will expire. That means that after next year, we will no longer be receiving
8072 the annual royalty check of $
100,
000 from the publishers of those works.
8074 "There's a proposal in Congress, however," she continues, "that could change
8075 this. A few congressmen are floating a bill to extend the terms of copyright
8076 by twenty years. That bill would be extraordinarily valuable to us. So we
8077 should hope this bill passes."
8079 "Hope?" a fellow board member says. "Can't we be doing something about it?"
8081 "Well, obviously, yes," the adviser responds. "We could contribute to the
8082 campaigns of a number of representatives to try to assure that they support
8085 You hate politics. You hate contributing to campaigns. So you want to know
8086 whether this disgusting practice is worth it. "How much would we get if this
8087 extension were passed?" you ask the adviser. "How much is it worth?"
8089 "Well," the adviser says, "if you're confident that you will continue to get
8090 at least $
100,
000 a year from these copyrights, and you use the `discount
8091 rate' that we use to evaluate estate investments (
6 percent), then this law
8092 would be worth $
1,
146,
000 to the estate."
8094 You're a bit shocked by the number, but you quickly come to the correct
8097 "So you're saying it would be worth it for us to pay more than $
1,
000,
000 in
8098 campaign contributions if we were confident those contributions would assure
8099 that the bill was passed?"
8101 "Absolutely," the adviser responds. "It is worth it to you to contribute up
8102 to the `present value' of the income you expect from these copyrights. Which
8103 for us means over $
1,
000,
000."
8106 You quickly get the point
—you as the member of the board and, I trust,
8107 you the reader. Each time copyrights are about to expire, every beneficiary
8108 in the position of the Robert Frost estate faces the same choice: If they
8109 can contribute to get a law passed to extend copyrights, they will benefit
8110 greatly from that extension. And so each time copyrights are about to
8111 expire, there is a massive amount of lobbying to get the copyright term
8114 Thus a congressional perpetual motion machine: So long as legislation can be
8115 bought (albeit indirectly), there will be all the incentive in the world to
8116 buy further extensions of copyright.
8118 In the lobbying that led to the passage of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term
8119 Extension Act, this "theory" about incentives was proved real. Ten of the
8120 thirteen original sponsors of the act in the House received the maximum
8121 contribution from Disney's political action committee; in the Senate, eight
8122 of the twelve sponsors received contributions.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963220" href=
"#ftn.id2963220" class=
"footnote">181</a>]
</sup> The RIAA and the MPAA are estimated to have spent over $
1.5 million
8123 lobbying in the
1998 election cycle. They paid out more than $
200,
000 in
8124 campaign contributions.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963235" href=
"#ftn.id2963235" class=
"footnote">182</a>]
</sup> Disney is
8125 estimated to have contributed more than $
800,
000 to reelection campaigns in
8126 the cycle.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963251" href=
"#ftn.id2963251" class=
"footnote">183</a>]
</sup>
8129 Constitutional law is not oblivious to the obvious. Or at least, it need not
8130 be. So when I was considering Eldred's complaint, this reality about the
8131 never-ending incentives to increase the copyright term was central to my
8132 thinking. In my view, a pragmatic court committed to interpreting and
8133 applying the Constitution of our framers would see that if Congress has the
8134 power to extend existing terms, then there would be no effective
8135 constitutional requirement that terms be "limited." If they could extend it
8136 once, they would extend it again and again and again.
8139 It was also my judgment that
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>this
</em></span> Supreme Court would
8140 not allow Congress to extend existing terms. As anyone close to the Supreme
8141 Court's work knows, this Court has increasingly restricted the power of
8142 Congress when it has viewed Congress's actions as exceeding the power
8143 granted to it by the Constitution. Among constitutional scholars, the most
8144 famous example of this trend was the Supreme Court's decision in
1995 to
8145 strike down a law that banned the possession of guns near schools.
8147 Since
1937, the Supreme Court had interpreted Congress's granted powers very
8148 broadly; so, while the Constitution grants Congress the power to regulate
8149 only "commerce among the several states" (aka "interstate commerce"), the
8150 Supreme Court had interpreted that power to include the power to regulate
8151 any activity that merely affected interstate commerce.
8153 As the economy grew, this standard increasingly meant that there was no
8154 limit to Congress's power to regulate, since just about every activity, when
8155 considered on a national scale, affects interstate commerce. A Constitution
8156 designed to limit Congress's power was instead interpreted to impose no
8159 The Supreme Court, under Chief Justice Rehnquist's command, changed that in
8160 <em class=
"citetitle">United States
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em>. The
8161 government had argued that possessing guns near schools affected interstate
8162 commerce. Guns near schools increase crime, crime lowers property values,
8163 and so on. In the oral argument, the Chief Justice asked the government
8164 whether there was any activity that would not affect interstate commerce
8165 under the reasoning the government advanced. The government said there was
8166 not; if Congress says an activity affects interstate commerce, then that
8167 activity affects interstate commerce. The Supreme Court, the government
8168 said, was not in the position to second-guess Congress.
8170 "We pause to consider the implications of the government's arguments," the
8171 Chief Justice wrote.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963351" href=
"#ftn.id2963351" class=
"footnote">184</a>]
</sup> If anything
8172 Congress says is interstate commerce must therefore be considered interstate
8173 commerce, then there would be no limit to Congress's power. The decision in
8174 <em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em> was reaffirmed five years later in
8175 <em class=
"citetitle">United States
</em>
8176 v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Morrison
</em>.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963377" href=
"#ftn.id2963377" class=
"footnote">185</a>]
</sup>
8179 If a principle were at work here, then it should apply to the Progress
8180 Clause as much as the Commerce Clause.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963398" href=
"#ftn.id2963398" class=
"footnote">186</a>]
</sup>
8181 And if it is applied to the Progress Clause, the principle should yield the
8182 conclusion that Congress can't extend an existing term. If Congress could
8183 extend an existing term, then there would be no "stopping point" to
8184 Congress's power over terms, though the Constitution expressly states that
8185 there is such a limit. Thus, the same principle applied to the power to
8186 grant copyrights should entail that Congress is not allowed to extend the
8187 term of existing copyrights.
8189 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>If
</em></span>, that is, the principle announced in
8190 <em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em> stood for a principle. Many believed the
8191 decision in
<em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em> stood for politics
—a
8192 conservative Supreme Court, which believed in states' rights, using its
8193 power over Congress to advance its own personal political preferences. But I
8194 rejected that view of the Supreme Court's decision. Indeed, shortly after
8195 the decision, I wrote an article demonstrating the "fidelity" in such an
8196 interpretation of the Constitution. The idea that the Supreme Court decides
8197 cases based upon its politics struck me as extraordinarily boring. I was
8198 not going to devote my life to teaching constitutional law if these nine
8199 Justices were going to be petty politicians.
8201 Now let's pause for a moment to make sure we understand what the argument in
8202 <em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em> was not about. By insisting on the
8203 Constitution's limits to copyright, obviously Eldred was not endorsing
8204 piracy. Indeed, in an obvious sense, he was fighting a kind of
8205 piracy
—piracy of the public domain. When Robert Frost wrote his work
8206 and when Walt Disney created Mickey Mouse, the maximum copyright term was
8207 just fifty-six years. Because of interim changes, Frost and Disney had
8208 already enjoyed a seventy-five-year monopoly for their work. They had gotten
8209 the benefit of the bargain that the Constitution envisions: In exchange for
8210 a monopoly protected for fifty-six years, they created new work. But now
8211 these entities were using their power
—expressed through the power of
8212 lobbyists' money
—to get another twenty-year dollop of monopoly. That
8213 twenty-year dollop would be taken from the public domain. Eric Eldred was
8214 fighting a piracy that affects us all.
8216 Some people view the public domain with contempt. In their brief before the
8217 Supreme Court, the Nashville Songwriters Association wrote that the public
8218 domain is nothing more than "legal piracy."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963477" href=
"#ftn.id2963477" class=
"footnote">187</a>]
</sup> But it is not piracy when the law allows it; and in our
8219 constitutional system, our law requires it. Some may not like the
8220 Constitution's requirements, but that doesn't make the Constitution a
8223 As we've seen, our constitutional system requires limits on copyright as a
8224 way to assure that copyright holders do not too heavily influence the
8225 development and distribution of our culture. Yet, as Eric Eldred discovered,
8226 we have set up a system that assures that copyright terms will be repeatedly
8227 extended, and extended, and extended. We have created the perfect storm for
8228 the public domain. Copyrights have not expired, and will not expire, so long
8229 as Congress is free to be bought to extend them again.
8231 It is valuable copyrights that are responsible for terms being extended.
8232 Mickey Mouse and "Rhapsody in Blue." These works are too valuable for
8233 copyright owners to ignore. But the real harm to our society from copyright
8234 extensions is not that Mickey Mouse remains Disney's. Forget Mickey
8235 Mouse. Forget Robert Frost. Forget all the works from the
1920s and
1930s
8236 that have continuing commercial value. The real harm of term extension comes
8237 not from these famous works. The real harm is to the works that are not
8238 famous, not commercially exploited, and no longer available as a result.
8240 If you look at the work created in the first twenty years (
1923 to
1942)
8241 affected by the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act,
2 percent of that
8242 work has any continuing commercial value. It was the copyright holders for
8243 that
2 percent who pushed the CTEA through. But the law and its effect were
8244 not limited to that
2 percent. The law extended the terms of copyright
8245 generally.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963536" href=
"#ftn.id2963536" class=
"footnote">188</a>]
</sup>
8249 Think practically about the consequence of this extension
—practically,
8250 as a businessperson, and not as a lawyer eager for more legal work. In
1930,
8251 10,
047 books were published. In
2000,
174 of those books were still in
8252 print. Let's say you were Brewster Kahle, and you wanted to make available
8253 to the world in your iArchive project the remaining
9,
873. What would you
8256 Well, first, you'd have to determine which of the
9,
873 books were still
8257 under copyright. That requires going to a library (these data are not
8258 on-line) and paging through tomes of books, cross-checking the titles and
8259 authors of the
9,
873 books with the copyright registration and renewal
8260 records for works published in
1930. That will produce a list of books still
8263 Then for the books still under copyright, you would need to locate the
8264 current copyright owners. How would you do that?
8266 Most people think that there must be a list of these copyright owners
8267 somewhere. Practical people think this way. How could there be thousands and
8268 thousands of government monopolies without there being at least a list?
8270 But there is no list. There may be a name from
1930, and then in
1959, of
8271 the person who registered the copyright. But just think practically about
8272 how impossibly difficult it would be to track down thousands of such
8273 records
—especially since the person who registered is not necessarily
8274 the current owner. And we're just talking about
1930!
8276 "But there isn't a list of who owns property generally," the apologists for
8277 the system respond. "Why should there be a list of copyright owners?"
8279 Well, actually, if you think about it, there
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>are
</em></span> plenty
8280 of lists of who owns what property. Think about deeds on houses, or titles
8281 to cars. And where there isn't a list, the code of real space is pretty
8282 good at suggesting who the owner of a bit of property is. (A swing set in
8283 your backyard is probably yours.) So formally or informally, we have a
8284 pretty good way to know who owns what tangible property.
8287 So: You walk down a street and see a house. You can know who owns the house
8288 by looking it up in the courthouse registry. If you see a car, there is
8289 ordinarily a license plate that will link the owner to the car. If you see a
8290 bunch of children's toys sitting on the front lawn of a house, it's fairly
8291 easy to determine who owns the toys. And if you happen to see a baseball
8292 lying in a gutter on the side of the road, look around for a second for some
8293 kids playing ball. If you don't see any kids, then okay: Here's a bit of
8294 property whose owner we can't easily determine. It is the exception that
8295 proves the rule: that we ordinarily know quite well who owns what property.
8297 Compare this story to intangible property. You go into a library. The
8298 library owns the books. But who owns the copyrights? As I've already
8299 described, there's no list of copyright owners. There are authors' names, of
8300 course, but their copyrights could have been assigned, or passed down in an
8301 estate like Grandma's old jewelry. To know who owns what, you would have to
8302 hire a private detective. The bottom line: The owner cannot easily be
8303 located. And in a regime like ours, in which it is a felony to use such
8304 property without the property owner's permission, the property isn't going
8307 The consequence with respect to old books is that they won't be digitized,
8308 and hence will simply rot away on shelves. But the consequence for other
8309 creative works is much more dire.
8310 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2963658"></a><p>
8311 Consider the story of Michael Agee, chairman of Hal Roach Studios, which
8312 owns the copyrights for the Laurel and Hardy films. Agee is a direct
8313 beneficiary of the Bono Act. The Laurel and Hardy films were made between
8314 1921 and
1951. Only one of these films,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Lucky
8315 Dog
</em>, is currently out of copyright. But for the CTEA, films made
8316 after
1923 would have begun entering the public domain. Because Agee
8317 controls the exclusive rights for these popular films, he makes a great deal
8318 of money. According to one estimate, "Roach has sold about
60,
000
8319 videocassettes and
50,
000 DVDs of the duo's silent films."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963680" href=
"#ftn.id2963680" class=
"footnote">189</a>]
</sup> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2963697"></a>
8321 Yet Agee opposed the CTEA. His reasons demonstrate a rare virtue in this
8322 culture: selflessness. He argued in a brief before the Supreme Court that
8323 the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act will, if left standing, destroy
8324 a whole generation of American film.
8327 His argument is straightforward. A tiny fraction of this work has any
8328 continuing commercial value. The rest
—to the extent it survives at
8329 all
—sits in vaults gathering dust. It may be that some of this work
8330 not now commercially valuable will be deemed to be valuable by the owners of
8331 the vaults. For this to occur, however, the commercial benefit from the work
8332 must exceed the costs of making the work available for distribution.
8334 We can't know the benefits, but we do know a lot about the costs. For most
8335 of the history of film, the costs of restoring film were very high; digital
8336 technology has lowered these costs substantially. While it cost more than
8337 $
10,
000 to restore a ninety-minute black-and-white film in
1993, it can now
8338 cost as little as $
100 to digitize one hour of mm film.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963734" href=
"#ftn.id2963734" class=
"footnote">190</a>]
</sup>
8341 Restoration technology is not the only cost, nor the most important.
8342 Lawyers, too, are a cost, and increasingly, a very important one. In
8343 addition to preserving the film, a distributor needs to secure the rights.
8344 And to secure the rights for a film that is under copyright, you need to
8345 locate the copyright owner.
8347 Or more accurately,
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>owners
</em></span>. As we've seen, there isn't
8348 only a single copyright associated with a film; there are many. There isn't
8349 a single person whom you can contact about those copyrights; there are as
8350 many as can hold the rights, which turns out to be an extremely large
8351 number. Thus the costs of clearing the rights to these films is
8354 "But can't you just restore the film, distribute it, and then pay the
8355 copyright owner when she shows up?" Sure, if you want to commit a
8356 felony. And even if you're not worried about committing a felony, when she
8357 does show up, she'll have the right to sue you for all the profits you have
8358 made. So, if you're successful, you can be fairly confident you'll be
8359 getting a call from someone's lawyer. And if you're not successful, you
8360 won't make enough to cover the costs of your own lawyer. Either way, you
8361 have to talk to a lawyer. And as is too often the case, saying you have to
8362 talk to a lawyer is the same as saying you won't make any money.
8365 For some films, the benefit of releasing the film may well exceed these
8366 costs. But for the vast majority of them, there is no way the benefit would
8367 outweigh the legal costs. Thus, for the vast majority of old films, Agee
8368 argued, the film will not be restored and distributed until the copyright
8371 But by the time the copyright for these films expires, the film will have
8372 expired. These films were produced on nitrate-based stock, and nitrate stock
8373 dissolves over time. They will be gone, and the metal canisters in which
8374 they are now stored will be filled with nothing more than dust.
8376 Of all the creative work produced by humans anywhere, a tiny fraction has
8377 continuing commercial value. For that tiny fraction, the copyright is a
8378 crucially important legal device. For that tiny fraction, the copyright
8379 creates incentives to produce and distribute the creative work. For that
8380 tiny fraction, the copyright acts as an "engine of free expression."
8382 But even for that tiny fraction, the actual time during which the creative
8383 work has a commercial life is extremely short. As I've indicated, most books
8384 go out of print within one year. The same is true of music and
8385 film. Commercial culture is sharklike. It must keep moving. And when a
8386 creative work falls out of favor with the commercial distributors, the
8387 commercial life ends.
8389 Yet that doesn't mean the life of the creative work ends. We don't keep
8390 libraries of books in order to compete with Barnes
& Noble, and we don't
8391 have archives of films because we expect people to choose between spending
8392 Friday night watching new movies and spending Friday night watching a
1930
8393 news documentary. The noncommercial life of culture is important and
8394 valuable
—for entertainment but also, and more importantly, for
8395 knowledge. To understand who we are, and where we came from, and how we have
8396 made the mistakes that we have, we need to have access to this history.
8399 Copyrights in this context do not drive an engine of free expression. In
8400 this context, there is no need for an exclusive right. Copyrights in this
8403 Yet, for most of our history, they also did little harm. For most of our
8404 history, when a work ended its commercial life, there was no
8405 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>copyright-related use
</em></span> that would be inhibited by an
8406 exclusive right. When a book went out of print, you could not buy it from a
8407 publisher. But you could still buy it from a used book store, and when a
8408 used book store sells it, in America, at least, there is no need to pay the
8409 copyright owner anything. Thus, the ordinary use of a book after its
8410 commercial life ended was a use that was independent of copyright law.
8412 The same was effectively true of film. Because the costs of restoring a
8413 film
—the real economic costs, not the lawyer costs
—were so high,
8414 it was never at all feasible to preserve or restore film. Like the remains
8415 of a great dinner, when it's over, it's over. Once a film passed out of its
8416 commercial life, it may have been archived for a bit, but that was the end
8417 of its life so long as the market didn't have more to offer.
8419 In other words, though copyright has been relatively short for most of our
8420 history, long copyrights wouldn't have mattered for the works that lost
8421 their commercial value. Long copyrights for these works would not have
8422 interfered with anything.
8424 But this situation has now changed.
8426 One crucially important consequence of the emergence of digital technologies
8427 is to enable the archive that Brewster Kahle dreams of. Digital
8428 technologies now make it possible to preserve and give access to all sorts
8429 of knowledge. Once a book goes out of print, we can now imagine digitizing
8430 it and making it available to everyone, forever. Once a film goes out of
8431 distribution, we could digitize it and make it available to everyone,
8432 forever. Digital technologies give new life to copyrighted material after it
8433 passes out of its commercial life. It is now possible to preserve and assure
8434 universal access to this knowledge and culture, whereas before it was not.
8438 And now copyright law does get in the way. Every step of producing this
8439 digital archive of our culture infringes on the exclusive right of
8440 copyright. To digitize a book is to copy it. To do that requires permission
8441 of the copyright owner. The same with music, film, or any other aspect of
8442 our culture protected by copyright. The effort to make these things
8443 available to history, or to researchers, or to those who just want to
8444 explore, is now inhibited by a set of rules that were written for a
8445 radically different context.
8447 Here is the core of the harm that comes from extending terms: Now that
8448 technology enables us to rebuild the library of Alexandria, the law gets in
8449 the way. And it doesn't get in the way for any useful
8450 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>copyright
</em></span> purpose, for the purpose of copyright is to
8451 enable the commercial market that spreads culture. No, we are talking about
8452 culture after it has lived its commercial life. In this context, copyright
8453 is serving no purpose
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>at all
</em></span> related to the spread of
8454 knowledge. In this context, copyright is not an engine of free
8455 expression. Copyright is a brake.
8457 You may well ask, "But if digital technologies lower the costs for Brewster
8458 Kahle, then they will lower the costs for Random House, too. So won't
8459 Random House do as well as Brewster Kahle in spreading culture widely?"
8461 Maybe. Someday. But there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that
8462 publishers would be as complete as libraries. If Barnes
& Noble offered
8463 to lend books from its stores for a low price, would that eliminate the need
8464 for libraries? Only if you think that the only role of a library is to serve
8465 what "the market" would demand. But if you think the role of a library is
8466 bigger than this
—if you think its role is to archive culture, whether
8467 there's a demand for any particular bit of that culture or not
—then we
8468 can't count on the commercial market to do our library work for us.
8470 I would be the first to agree that it should do as much as it can: We should
8471 rely upon the market as much as possible to spread and enable culture. My
8472 message is absolutely not antimarket. But where we see the market is not
8473 doing the job, then we should allow nonmarket forces the freedom to fill the
8474 gaps. As one researcher calculated for American culture,
94 percent of the
8475 films, books, and music produced between and
1946 is not commercially
8476 available. However much you love the commercial market, if access is a
8477 value, then
6 percent is a failure to provide that value.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2963964" href=
"#ftn.id2963964" class=
"footnote">191</a>]
</sup>
8480 In January
1999, we filed a lawsuit on Eric Eldred's behalf in federal
8481 district court in Washington, D.C., asking the court to declare the Sonny
8482 Bono Copyright Term Extension Act unconstitutional. The two central claims
8483 that we made were (
1) that extending existing terms violated the
8484 Constitution's "limited Times" requirement, and (
2) that extending terms by
8485 another twenty years violated the First Amendment.
8487 The district court dismissed our claims without even hearing an argument. A
8488 panel of the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit also dismissed our
8489 claims, though after hearing an extensive argument. But that decision at
8490 least had a dissent, by one of the most conservative judges on that
8491 court. That dissent gave our claims life.
8493 Judge David Sentelle said the CTEA violated the requirement that copyrights
8494 be for "limited Times" only. His argument was as elegant as it was simple:
8495 If Congress can extend existing terms, then there is no "stopping point" to
8496 Congress's power under the Copyright Clause. The power to extend existing
8497 terms means Congress is not required to grant terms that are "limited."
8498 Thus, Judge Sentelle argued, the court had to interpret the term "limited
8499 Times" to give it meaning. And the best interpretation, Judge Sentelle
8500 argued, would be to deny Congress the power to extend existing terms.
8502 We asked the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit as a whole to hear the
8503 case. Cases are ordinarily heard in panels of three, except for important
8504 cases or cases that raise issues specific to the circuit as a whole, where
8505 the court will sit "en banc" to hear the case.
8508 The Court of Appeals rejected our request to hear the case en banc. This
8509 time, Judge Sentelle was joined by the most liberal member of the
8510 D.C. Circuit, Judge David Tatel. Both the most conservative and the most
8511 liberal judges in the D.C. Circuit believed Congress had overstepped its
8514 It was here that most expected Eldred v. Ashcroft would die, for the Supreme
8515 Court rarely reviews any decision by a court of appeals. (It hears about one
8516 hundred cases a year, out of more than five thousand appeals.) And it
8517 practically never reviews a decision that upholds a statute when no other
8518 court has yet reviewed the statute.
8520 But in February
2002, the Supreme Court surprised the world by granting our
8521 petition to review the D.C. Circuit opinion. Argument was set for October of
8522 2002. The summer would be spent writing briefs and preparing for argument.
8524 It is over a year later as I write these words. It is still astonishingly
8525 hard. If you know anything at all about this story, you know that we lost
8526 the appeal. And if you know something more than just the minimum, you
8527 probably think there was no way this case could have been won. After our
8528 defeat, I received literally thousands of missives by well-wishers and
8529 supporters, thanking me for my work on behalf of this noble but doomed
8530 cause. And none from this pile was more significant to me than the e-mail
8531 from my client, Eric Eldred.
8533 Men min klient og disse vennene tok feil. Denne saken kunne vært vunnet. Det
8534 burde ha vært vunnet. Og uansett hvor hardt jeg prøver å fortelle den
8535 historien til meg selv, kan jeg aldri unnslippe troen på at det er min feil
8537 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964083"></a><p>
8539 Feil ble gjort tidlig, skjønt den ble først åpenbart på slutten. Vår sak
8540 hadde støtte hos en ekstraordinær advokat, Geoffrey Stewart, helt fra
8541 starten, og hos advokatfirmaet hadde han flyttet til, Jones, Day, Reavis og
8542 Pogue. Jones Day mottok mye press fra sine opphavsrettsbeskyttende klienter
8543 på grunn av sin støtte til oss. De ignorert dette presset (noe veldig få
8544 advokatfirmaer noen sinne ville gjøre), og ga alt de hadde gjennom hele
8546 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964106"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964112"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964118"></a><p>
8547 Det var tre viktige advokater på saken fra Jones DaY. Geoff Stewart var den
8548 først, men siden ble Dan Bromberg og Don Ayer ganske involvert. Bromberg og
8549 Ayer spesielt hadde en felles oppfatning om hvordan denne saken ville bli
8550 vunnet: vi ville bare vinne, fortalte de gjentatte ganger til meg, hvis vi
8551 få problemet til å virke "viktig" for Høyesterett. Det måtte synes som om
8552 dramatisk skade ble gjort til ytringsfriheten og fri kultur, ellers ville de
8553 aldri stemt mot "de mektigste mediaselskapene i verden".
8555 I hate this view of the law. Of course I thought the Sonny Bono Act was a
8556 dramatic harm to free speech and free culture. Of course I still think it
8557 is. But the idea that the Supreme Court decides the law based on how
8558 important they believe the issues are is just wrong. It might be "right" as
8559 in "true," I thought, but it is "wrong" as in "it just shouldn't be that
8560 way." As I believed that any faithful interpretation of what the framers of
8561 our Constitution did would yield the conclusion that the CTEA was
8562 unconstitutional, and as I believed that any faithful interpretation of what
8563 the First Amendment means would yield the conclusion that the power to
8564 extend existing copyright terms is unconstitutional, I was not persuaded
8565 that we had to sell our case like soap. Just as a law that bans the
8566 swastika is unconstitutional not because the Court likes Nazis but because
8567 such a law would violate the Constitution, so too, in my view, would the
8568 Court decide whether Congress's law was constitutional based on the
8569 Constitution, not based on whether they liked the values that the framers
8570 put in the Constitution.
8572 In any case, I thought, the Court must already see the danger and the harm
8573 caused by this sort of law. Why else would they grant review? There was no
8574 reason to hear the case in the Supreme Court if they weren't convinced that
8575 this regulation was harmful. So in my view, we didn't need to persuade them
8576 that this law was bad, we needed to show why it was unconstitutional.
8579 There was one way, however, in which I felt politics would matter and in
8580 which I thought a response was appropriate. I was convinced that the Court
8581 would not hear our arguments if it thought these were just the arguments of
8582 a group of lefty loons. This Supreme Court was not about to launch into a
8583 new field of judicial review if it seemed that this field of review was
8584 simply the preference of a small political minority. Although my focus in
8585 the case was not to demonstrate how bad the Sonny Bono Act was but to
8586 demonstrate that it was unconstitutional, my hope was to make this argument
8587 against a background of briefs that covered the full range of political
8588 views. To show that this claim against the CTEA was grounded in
8589 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>law
</em></span> and not politics, then, we tried to gather the
8590 widest range of credible critics
—credible not because they were rich
8591 and famous, but because they, in the aggregate, demonstrated that this law
8592 was unconstitutional regardless of one's politics.
8594 The first step happened all by itself. Phyllis Schlafly's organization,
8595 Eagle Forum, had been an opponent of the CTEA from the very beginning.
8596 Mrs. Schlafly viewed the CTEA as a sellout by Congress. In November
1998,
8597 she wrote a stinging editorial attacking the Republican Congress for
8598 allowing the law to pass. As she wrote, "Do you sometimes wonder why bills
8599 that create a financial windfall to narrow special interests slide easily
8600 through the intricate legislative process, while bills that benefit the
8601 general public seem to get bogged down?" The answer, as the editorial
8602 documented, was the power of money. Schlafly enumerated Disney's
8603 contributions to the key players on the committees. It was money, not
8604 justice, that gave Mickey Mouse twenty more years in Disney's control,
8605 Schlafly argued.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964224"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964230"></a>
8607 In the Court of Appeals, Eagle Forum was eager to file a brief supporting
8608 our position. Their brief made the argument that became the core claim in
8609 the Supreme Court: If Congress can extend the term of existing copyrights,
8610 there is no limit to Congress's power to set terms. That strong
8611 conservative argument persuaded a strong conservative judge, Judge Sentelle.
8613 In the Supreme Court, the briefs on our side were about as diverse as it
8614 gets. They included an extraordinary historical brief by the Free Software
8615 Foundation (home of the GNU project that made GNU/ Linux possible). They
8616 included a powerful brief about the costs of uncertainty by Intel. There
8617 were two law professors' briefs, one by copyright scholars and one by First
8618 Amendment scholars. There was an exhaustive and uncontroverted brief by the
8619 world's experts in the history of the Progress Clause. And of course, there
8620 was a new brief by Eagle Forum, repeating and strengthening its arguments.
8621 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964259"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964267"></a>
8623 Those briefs framed a legal argument. Then to support the legal argument,
8624 there were a number of powerful briefs by libraries and archives, including
8625 the Internet Archive, the American Association of Law Libraries, and the
8626 National Writers Union.
8628 But two briefs captured the policy argument best. One made the argument I've
8629 already described: A brief by Hal Roach Studios argued that unless the law
8630 was struck, a whole generation of American film would disappear. The other
8631 made the economic argument absolutely clear.
8632 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964290"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964296"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964303"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964309"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964315"></a><p>
8633 This economists' brief was signed by seventeen economists, including five
8634 Nobel Prize winners, including Ronald Coase, James Buchanan, Milton
8635 Friedman, Kenneth Arrow, and George Akerlof. The economists, as the list of
8636 Nobel winners demonstrates, spanned the political spectrum. Their
8637 conclusions were powerful: There was no plausible claim that extending the
8638 terms of existing copyrights would do anything to increase incentives to
8639 create. Such extensions were nothing more than "rent-seeking"
—the
8640 fancy term economists use to describe special-interest legislation gone
8643 The same effort at balance was reflected in the legal team we gathered to
8644 write our briefs in the case. The Jones Day lawyers had been with us from
8645 the start. But when the case got to the Supreme Court, we added three
8646 lawyers to help us frame this argument to this Court: Alan Morrison, a
8647 lawyer from Public Citizen, a Washington group that had made constitutional
8648 history with a series of seminal victories in the Supreme Court defending
8649 individual rights; my colleague and dean, Kathleen Sullivan, who had argued
8650 many cases in the Court, and who had advised us early on about a First
8651 Amendment strategy; and finally, former solicitor general Charles Fried.
8652 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964335"></a>
8654 Fried was a special victory for our side. Every other former solicitor
8655 general was hired by the other side to defend Congress's power to give media
8656 companies the special favor of extended copyright terms. Fried was the only
8657 one who turned down that lucrative assignment to stand up for something he
8658 believed in. He had been Ronald Reagan's chief lawyer in the Supreme
8659 Court. He had helped craft the line of cases that limited Congress's power
8660 in the context of the Commerce Clause. And while he had argued many
8661 positions in the Supreme Court that I personally disagreed with, his joining
8662 the cause was a vote of confidence in our argument.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964371"></a>
8664 The government, in defending the statute, had its collection of friends, as
8665 well. Significantly, however, none of these "friends" included historians or
8666 economists. The briefs on the other side of the case were written
8667 exclusively by major media companies, congressmen, and copyright holders.
8669 The media companies were not surprising. They had the most to gain from the
8670 law. The congressmen were not surprising either
—they were defending
8671 their power and, indirectly, the gravy train of contributions such power
8672 induced. And of course it was not surprising that the copyright holders
8673 would defend the idea that they should continue to have the right to control
8674 who did what with content they wanted to control.
8676 Dr. Seuss's representatives, for example, argued that it was better for the
8677 Dr. Seuss estate to control what happened to Dr. Seuss's work
— better
8678 than allowing it to fall into the public domain
—because if this
8679 creativity were in the public domain, then people could use it to "glorify
8680 drugs or to create pornography."
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2964401" href=
"#ftn.id2964401" class=
"footnote">192</a>]
</sup> That
8681 was also the motive of the Gershwin estate, which defended its "protection"
8682 of the work of George Gershwin. They refuse, for example, to license
8683 <em class=
"citetitle">Porgy and Bess
</em> to anyone who refuses to use African
8684 Americans in the cast.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2964426" href=
"#ftn.id2964426" class=
"footnote">193</a>]
</sup> That's their
8685 view of how this part of American culture should be controlled, and they
8686 wanted this law to help them effect that control.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964440"></a>
8688 This argument made clear a theme that is rarely noticed in this debate.
8689 When Congress decides to extend the term of existing copyrights, Congress is
8690 making a choice about which speakers it will favor. Famous and beloved
8691 copyright owners, such as the Gershwin estate and Dr. Seuss, come to
8692 Congress and say, "Give us twenty years to control the speech about these
8693 icons of American culture. We'll do better with them than anyone else."
8694 Congress of course likes to reward the popular and famous by giving them
8695 what they want. But when Congress gives people an exclusive right to speak
8696 in a certain way, that's just what the First Amendment is traditionally
8699 We argued as much in a final brief. Not only would upholding the CTEA mean
8700 that there was no limit to the power of Congress to extend
8701 copyrights
—extensions that would further concentrate the market; it
8702 would also mean that there was no limit to Congress's power to play
8703 favorites, through copyright, with who has the right to speak. Between
8704 February and October, there was little I did beyond preparing for this
8705 case. Early on, as I said, I set the strategy.
8707 The Supreme Court was divided into two important camps. One camp we called
8708 "the Conservatives." The other we called "the Rest." The Conservatives
8709 included Chief Justice Rehnquist, Justice O'Connor, Justice Scalia, Justice
8710 Kennedy, and Justice Thomas. These five had been the most consistent in
8711 limiting Congress's power. They were the five who had supported the
8712 <em class=
"citetitle">Lopez/Morrison
</em> line of cases that said that an
8713 enumerated power had to be interpreted to assure that Congress's powers had
8715 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964501"></a><p>
8717 The Rest were the four Justices who had strongly opposed limits on
8718 Congress's power. These four
—Justice Stevens, Justice Souter, Justice
8719 Ginsburg, and Justice Breyer
—had repeatedly argued that the
8720 Constitution gives Congress broad discretion to decide how best to implement
8721 its powers. In case after case, these justices had argued that the Court's
8722 role should be one of deference. Though the votes of these four justices
8723 were the votes that I personally had most consistently agreed with, they
8724 were also the votes that we were least likely to get.
8726 In particular, the least likely was Justice Ginsburg's. In addition to her
8727 general view about deference to Congress (except where issues of gender are
8728 involved), she had been particularly deferential in the context of
8729 intellectual property protections. She and her daughter (an excellent and
8730 well-known intellectual property scholar) were cut from the same
8731 intellectual property cloth. We expected she would agree with the writings
8732 of her daughter: that Congress had the power in this context to do as it
8733 wished, even if what Congress wished made little sense.
8734 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964535"></a><p>
8735 Close behind Justice Ginsburg were two justices whom we also viewed as
8736 unlikely allies, though possible surprises. Justice Souter strongly favored
8737 deference to Congress, as did Justice Breyer. But both were also very
8738 sensitive to free speech concerns. And as we strongly believed, there was a
8739 very important free speech argument against these retrospective extensions.
8741 The only vote we could be confident about was that of Justice
8742 Stevens. History will record Justice Stevens as one of the greatest judges
8743 on this Court. His votes are consistently eclectic, which just means that no
8744 simple ideology explains where he will stand. But he had consistently argued
8745 for limits in the context of intellectual property generally. We were fairly
8746 confident he would recognize limits here.
8748 This analysis of "the Rest" showed most clearly where our focus had to be:
8749 on the Conservatives. To win this case, we had to crack open these five and
8750 get at least a majority to go our way. Thus, the single overriding argument
8751 that animated our claim rested on the Conservatives' most important
8752 jurisprudential innovation
—the argument that Judge Sentelle had relied
8753 upon in the Court of Appeals, that Congress's power must be interpreted so
8754 that its enumerated powers have limits.
8757 This then was the core of our strategy
—a strategy for which I am
8758 responsible. We would get the Court to see that just as with the
8759 <em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em> case, under the government's argument here,
8760 Congress would always have unlimited power to extend existing terms. If
8761 anything was plain about Congress's power under the Progress Clause, it was
8762 that this power was supposed to be "limited." Our aim would be to get the
8763 Court to reconcile
<em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em> with
8764 <em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em>: If Congress's power to regulate commerce was
8765 limited, then so, too, must Congress's power to regulate copyright be
8768 The argument on the government's side came down to this: Congress has done
8769 it before. It should be allowed to do it again. The government claimed that
8770 from the very beginning, Congress has been extending the term of existing
8771 copyrights. So, the government argued, the Court should not now say that
8772 practice is unconstitutional.
8774 There was some truth to the government's claim, but not much. We certainly
8775 agreed that Congress had extended existing terms in and in
1909. And of
8776 course, in
1962, Congress began extending existing terms
8777 regularly
—eleven times in forty years.
8780 But this "consistency" should be kept in perspective. Congress extended
8781 existing terms once in the first hundred years of the Republic. It then
8782 extended existing terms once again in the next fifty. Those rare extensions
8783 are in contrast to the now regular practice of extending existing
8784 terms. Whatever restraint Congress had had in the past, that restraint was
8785 now gone. Congress was now in a cycle of extensions; there was no reason to
8786 expect that cycle would end. This Court had not hesitated to intervene where
8787 Congress was in a similar cycle of extension. There was no reason it
8788 couldn't intervene here. Oral argument was scheduled for the first week in
8789 October. I arrived in D.C. two weeks before the argument. During those two
8790 weeks, I was repeatedly "mooted" by lawyers who had volunteered to help in
8791 the case. Such "moots" are basically practice rounds, where wannabe justices
8792 fire questions at wannabe winners.
8794 I was convinced that to win, I had to keep the Court focused on a single
8795 point: that if this extension is permitted, then there is no limit to the
8796 power to set terms. Going with the government would mean that terms would be
8797 effectively unlimited; going with us would give Congress a clear line to
8798 follow: Don't extend existing terms. The moots were an effective practice; I
8799 found ways to take every question back to this central idea.
8800 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964648"></a><p>
8801 One moot was before the lawyers at Jones Day. Don Ayer was the skeptic. He
8802 had served in the Reagan Justice Department with Solicitor General Charles
8803 Fried. He had argued many cases before the Supreme Court. And in his review
8804 of the moot, he let his concern speak:
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964661"></a>
8806 "I'm just afraid that unless they really see the harm, they won't be willing
8807 to upset this practice that the government says has been a consistent
8808 practice for two hundred years. You have to make them see the
8809 harm
—passionately get them to see the harm. For if they don't see
8810 that, then we haven't any chance of winning."
8811 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964670"></a><p>
8813 He may have argued many cases before this Court, I thought, but he didn't
8814 understand its soul. As a clerk, I had seen the Justices do the right
8815 thing
—not because of politics but because it was right. As a law
8816 professor, I had spent my life teaching my students that this Court does the
8817 right thing
—not because of politics but because it is right. As I
8818 listened to Ayer's plea for passion in pressing politics, I understood his
8819 point, and I rejected it. Our argument was right. That was enough. Let the
8820 politicians learn to see that it was also good. The night before the
8821 argument, a line of people began to form in front of the Supreme Court. The
8822 case had become a focus of the press and of the movement to free
8823 culture. Hundreds stood in line for the chance to see the
8824 proceedings. Scores spent the night on the Supreme Court steps so that they
8825 would be assured a seat.
8827 Not everyone has to wait in line. People who know the Justices can ask for
8828 seats they control. (I asked Justice Scalia's chambers for seats for my
8829 parents, for example.) Members of the Supreme Court bar can get a seat in a
8830 special section reserved for them. And senators and congressmen have a
8831 special place where they get to sit, too. And finally, of course, the press
8832 has a gallery, as do clerks working for the Justices on the Court. As we
8833 entered that morning, there was no place that was not taken. This was an
8834 argument about intellectual property law, yet the halls were filled. As I
8835 walked in to take my seat at the front of the Court, I saw my parents
8836 sitting on the left. As I sat down at the table, I saw Jack Valenti sitting
8837 in the special section ordinarily reserved for family of the Justices.
8839 When the Chief Justice called me to begin my argument, I began where I
8840 intended to stay: on the question of the limits on Congress's power. This
8841 was a case about enumerated powers, I said, and whether those enumerated
8842 powers had any limit.
8844 Justice O'Connor stopped me within one minute of my opening. The history
8846 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
8847 justice o'connor: Congress has extended the term so often through the years,
8848 and if you are right, don't we run the risk of upsetting previous extensions
8849 of time? I mean, this seems to be a practice that began with the very first
8851 </p></blockquote></div><p>
8852 She was quite willing to concede "that this flies directly in the face of
8853 what the framers had in mind." But my response again and again was to
8854 emphasize limits on Congress's power.
8855 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
8857 mr. lessig: Well, if it flies in the face of what the framers had in mind,
8858 then the question is, is there a way of interpreting their words that gives
8859 effect to what they had in mind, and the answer is yes.
8860 </p></blockquote></div><p>
8861 There were two points in this argument when I should have seen where the
8862 Court was going. The first was a question by Justice Kennedy, who observed,
8863 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
8864 justice kennedy: Well, I suppose implicit in the argument that the '
76 act,
8865 too, should have been declared void, and that we might leave it alone
8866 because of the disruption, is that for all these years the act has impeded
8867 progress in science and the useful arts. I just don't see any empirical
8869 </p></blockquote></div><p>
8870 Here follows my clear mistake. Like a professor correcting a student, I
8872 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
8873 mr. lessig: Justice, we are not making an empirical claim at all. Nothing
8874 in our Copyright Clause claim hangs upon the empirical assertion about
8875 impeding progress. Our only argument is this is a structural limit necessary
8876 to assure that what would be an effectively perpetual term not be permitted
8877 under the copyright laws.
8878 </p></blockquote></div><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964797"></a><p>
8879 That was a correct answer, but it wasn't the right answer. The right answer
8880 was instead that there was an obvious and profound harm. Any number of
8881 briefs had been written about it. He wanted to hear it. And here was the
8882 place Don Ayer's advice should have mattered. This was a softball; my answer
8883 was a swing and a miss.
8885 The second came from the Chief, for whom the whole case had been
8886 crafted. For the Chief Justice had crafted the
<em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em>
8887 ruling, and we hoped that he would see this case as its second cousin.
8890 It was clear a second into his question that he wasn't at all sympathetic.
8891 To him, we were a bunch of anarchists. As he asked:
8894 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
8895 chief justice: Well, but you want more than that. You want the right to copy
8896 verbatim other people's books, don't you?
8898 mr. lessig: We want the right to copy verbatim works that should be in the
8899 public domain and would be in the public domain but for a statute that
8900 cannot be justified under ordinary First Amendment analysis or under a
8901 proper reading of the limits built into the Copyright Clause.
8902 </p></blockquote></div><p>
8903 Things went better for us when the government gave its argument; for now the
8904 Court picked up on the core of our claim. As Justice Scalia asked Solicitor
8906 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
8907 justice scalia: You say that the functional equivalent of an unlimited time
8908 would be a violation [of the Constitution], but that's precisely the
8909 argument that's being made by petitioners here, that a limited time which is
8910 extendable is the functional equivalent of an unlimited time.
8911 </p></blockquote></div><p>
8912 When Olson was finished, it was my turn to give a closing rebuttal. Olson's
8913 flailing had revived my anger. But my anger still was directed to the
8914 academic, not the practical. The government was arguing as if this were the
8915 first case ever to consider limits on Congress's Copyright and Patent Clause
8916 power. Ever the professor and not the advocate, I closed by pointing out the
8917 long history of the Court imposing limits on Congress's power in the name of
8918 the Copyright and Patent Clause
— indeed, the very first case striking
8919 a law of Congress as exceeding a specific enumerated power was based upon
8920 the Copyright and Patent Clause. All true. But it wasn't going to move the
8924 As I left the court that day, I knew there were a hundred points I wished I
8925 could remake. There were a hundred questions I wished I had answered
8926 differently. But one way of thinking about this case left me optimistic.
8928 The government had been asked over and over again, what is the limit? Over
8929 and over again, it had answered there is no limit. This was precisely the
8930 answer I wanted the Court to hear. For I could not imagine how the Court
8931 could understand that the government believed Congress's power was unlimited
8932 under the terms of the Copyright Clause, and sustain the government's
8933 argument. The solicitor general had made my argument for me. No matter how
8934 often I tried, I could not understand how the Court could find that
8935 Congress's power under the Commerce Clause was limited, but under the
8936 Copyright Clause, unlimited. In those rare moments when I let myself believe
8937 that we may have prevailed, it was because I felt this Court
—in
8938 particular, the Conservatives
—would feel itself constrained by the
8939 rule of law that it had established elsewhere.
8941 The morning of January
15,
2003, I was five minutes late to the office and
8942 missed the
7:
00 A.M. call from the Supreme Court clerk. Listening to the
8943 message, I could tell in an instant that she had bad news to report.The
8944 Supreme Court had affirmed the decision of the Court of Appeals. Seven
8945 justices had voted in the majority. There were two dissents.
8947 A few seconds later, the opinions arrived by e-mail. I took the phone off
8948 the hook, posted an announcement to our blog, and sat down to see where I
8949 had been wrong in my reasoning.
8951 My
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>reasoning
</em></span>. Here was a case that pitted all the money
8952 in the world against
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>reasoning
</em></span>. And here was the last
8953 naïve law professor, scouring the pages, looking for reasoning.
8955 I first scoured the opinion, looking for how the Court would distinguish the
8956 principle in this case from the principle in
8957 <em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em>. The argument was nowhere to be found. The case
8958 was not even cited. The argument that was the core argument of our case did
8959 not even appear in the Court's opinion.
8964 Justice Ginsburg simply ignored the enumerated powers argument. Consistent
8965 with her view that Congress's power was not limited generally, she had found
8966 Congress's power not limited here.
8968 Her opinion was perfectly reasonable
—for her, and for Justice
8969 Souter. Neither believes in
<em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em>. It would be too
8970 much to expect them to write an opinion that recognized, much less
8971 explained, the doctrine they had worked so hard to defeat.
8973 But as I realized what had happened, I couldn't quite believe what I was
8974 reading. I had said there was no way this Court could reconcile limited
8975 powers with the Commerce Clause and unlimited powers with the Progress
8976 Clause. It had never even occurred to me that they could reconcile the two
8977 simply
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>by not addressing the argument
</em></span>. There was no
8978 inconsistency because they would not talk about the two together. There was
8979 therefore no principle that followed from the
<em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em>
8980 case: In that context, Congress's power would be limited, but in this
8981 context it would not.
8983 Yet by what right did they get to choose which of the framers' values they
8984 would respect? By what right did they
—the silent five
—get to
8985 select the part of the Constitution they would enforce based on the values
8986 they thought important? We were right back to the argument that I said I
8987 hated at the start: I had failed to convince them that the issue here was
8988 important, and I had failed to recognize that however much I might hate a
8989 system in which the Court gets to pick the constitutional values that it
8990 will respect, that is the system we have.
8991 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2964987"></a><p>
8992 Justices Breyer and Stevens wrote very strong dissents. Stevens's opinion
8993 was crafted internal to the law: He argued that the tradition of
8994 intellectual property law should not support this unjustified extension of
8995 terms. He based his argument on a parallel analysis that had governed in the
8996 context of patents (so had we). But the rest of the Court discounted the
8997 parallel
—without explaining how the very same words in the Progress
8998 Clause could come to mean totally different things depending upon whether
8999 the words were about patents or copyrights. The Court let Justice Stevens's
9000 charge go unanswered.
9001 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965006"></a><p>
9004 Justice Breyer's opinion, perhaps the best opinion he has ever written, was
9005 external to the Constitution. He argued that the term of copyrights has
9006 become so long as to be effectively unlimited. We had said that under the
9007 current term, a copyright gave an author
99.8 percent of the value of a
9008 perpetual term. Breyer said we were wrong, that the actual number was
9009 99.9997 percent of a perpetual term. Either way, the point was clear: If the
9010 Constitution said a term had to be "limited," and the existing term was so
9011 long as to be effectively unlimited, then it was unconstitutional.
9013 These two justices understood all the arguments we had made. But because
9014 neither believed in the
<em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em> case, neither was
9015 willing to push it as a reason to reject this extension. The case was
9016 decided without anyone having addressed the argument that we had carried
9017 from Judge Sentelle. It was
<em class=
"citetitle">Hamlet
</em> without the
9020 Defeat brings depression. They say it is a sign of health when depression
9021 gives way to anger. My anger came quickly, but it didn't cure the
9022 depression. This anger was of two sorts.
9024 It was first anger with the five "Conservatives." It would have been one
9025 thing for them to have explained why the principle of
9026 <em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em> didn't apply in this case. That wouldn't have
9027 been a very convincing argument, I don't believe, having read it made by
9028 others, and having tried to make it myself. But it at least would have been
9029 an act of integrity. These justices in particular have repeatedly said that
9030 the proper mode of interpreting the Constitution is "originalism"
—to
9031 first understand the framers' text, interpreted in their context, in light
9032 of the structure of the Constitution. That method had produced
9033 <em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em> and many other "originalist" rulings. Where was
9034 their "originalism" now?
9037 Here, they had joined an opinion that never once tried to explain what the
9038 framers had meant by crafting the Progress Clause as they did; they joined
9039 an opinion that never once tried to explain how the structure of that clause
9040 would affect the interpretation of Congress's power. And they joined an
9041 opinion that didn't even try to explain why this grant of power could be
9042 unlimited, whereas the Commerce Clause would be limited. In short, they had
9043 joined an opinion that did not apply to, and was inconsistent with, their
9044 own method for interpreting the Constitution. This opinion may well have
9045 yielded a result that they liked. It did not produce a reason that was
9046 consistent with their own principles.
9048 My anger with the Conservatives quickly yielded to anger with myself. For I
9049 had let a view of the law that I liked interfere with a view of the law as
9051 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965106"></a><p>
9052 Most lawyers, and most law professors, have little patience for idealism
9053 about courts in general and this Supreme Court in particular. Most have a
9054 much more pragmatic view. When Don Ayer said that this case would be won
9055 based on whether I could convince the Justices that the framers' values were
9056 important, I fought the idea, because I didn't want to believe that that is
9057 how this Court decides. I insisted on arguing this case as if it were a
9058 simple application of a set of principles. I had an argument that followed
9059 in logic. I didn't need to waste my time showing it should also follow in
9063 As I read back over the transcript from that argument in October, I can see
9064 a hundred places where the answers could have taken the conversation in
9065 different directions, where the truth about the harm that this unchecked
9066 power will cause could have been made clear to this Court. Justice Kennedy
9067 in good faith wanted to be shown. I, idiotically, corrected his
9068 question. Justice Souter in good faith wanted to be shown the First
9069 Amendment harms. I, like a math teacher, reframed the question to make the
9070 logical point. I had shown them how they could strike this law of Congress
9071 if they wanted to. There were a hundred places where I could have helped
9072 them want to, yet my stubbornness, my refusal to give in, stopped me. I have
9073 stood before hundreds of audiences trying to persuade; I have used passion
9074 in that effort to persuade; but I refused to stand before this audience and
9075 try to persuade with the passion I had used elsewhere. It was not the basis
9076 on which a court should decide the issue.
9077 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965148"></a><p>
9078 Would it have been different if I had argued it differently? Would it have
9079 been different if Don Ayer had argued it? Or Charles Fried? Or Kathleen
9080 Sullivan?
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965159"></a>
9082 My friends huddled around me to insist it would not. The Court was not
9083 ready, my friends insisted. This was a loss that was destined. It would take
9084 a great deal more to show our society why our framers were right. And when
9085 we do that, we will be able to show that Court.
9087 Maybe, but I doubt it. These Justices have no financial interest in doing
9088 anything except the right thing. They are not lobbied. They have little
9089 reason to resist doing right. I can't help but think that if I had stepped
9090 down from this pretty picture of dispassionate justice, I could have
9093 And even if I couldn't, then that doesn't excuse what happened in
9094 January. For at the start of this case, one of America's leading
9095 intellectual property professors stated publicly that my bringing this case
9096 was a mistake. "The Court is not ready," Peter Jaszi said; this issue should
9097 not be raised until it is.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965190"></a>
9100 After the argument and after the decision, Peter said to me, and publicly,
9101 that he was wrong. But if indeed that Court could not have been persuaded,
9102 then that is all the evidence that's needed to know that here again Peter
9103 was right. Either I was not ready to argue this case in a way that would do
9104 some good or they were not ready to hear this case in a way that would do
9105 some good. Either way, the decision to bring this case
—a decision I
9106 had made four years before
—was wrong. While the reaction to the Sonny
9107 Bono Act itself was almost unanimously negative, the reaction to the Court's
9108 decision was mixed. No one, at least in the press, tried to say that
9109 extending the term of copyright was a good idea. We had won that battle over
9110 ideas. Where the decision was praised, it was praised by papers that had
9111 been skeptical of the Court's activism in other cases. Deference was a good
9112 thing, even if it left standing a silly law. But where the decision was
9113 attacked, it was attacked because it left standing a silly and harmful
9114 law.
<em class=
"citetitle">The New York Times
</em> wrote in its editorial,
9115 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
9116 In effect, the Supreme Court's decision makes it likely that we are seeing
9117 the beginning of the end of public domain and the birth of copyright
9118 perpetuity. The public domain has been a grand experiment, one that should
9119 not be allowed to die. The ability to draw freely on the entire creative
9120 output of humanity is one of the reasons we live in a time of such fruitful
9122 </p></blockquote></div><p>
9123 The best responses were in the cartoons. There was a gaggle of hilarious
9124 images
—of Mickey in jail and the like. The best, from my view of the
9125 case, was Ruben Bolling's, reproduced on the next page. The "powerful and
9126 wealthy" line is a bit unfair. But the punch in the face felt exactly like
9127 that.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965074"></a>
9129 The image that will always stick in my head is that evoked by the quote from
9130 <em class=
"citetitle">The New York Times
</em>. That "grand experiment" we call
9131 the "public domain" is over? When I can make light of it, I think, "Honey, I
9132 shrunk the Constitution." But I can rarely make light of it. We had in our
9133 Constitution a commitment to free culture. In the case that I fathered, the
9134 Supreme Court effectively renounced that commitment. A better lawyer would
9135 have made them see differently.
9136 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2962945" href=
"#id2962945" class=
"para">179</a>]
</sup>
9139 There's a parallel here with pornography that is a bit hard to describe, but
9140 it's a strong one. One phenomenon that the Internet created was a world of
9141 noncommercial pornographers
—people who were distributing porn but were
9142 not making money directly or indirectly from that distribution. Such a
9143 class didn't exist before the Internet came into being because the costs of
9144 distributing porn were so high. Yet this new class of distributors got
9145 special attention in the Supreme Court, when the Court struck down the
9146 Communications Decency Act of
1996. It was partly because of the burden on
9147 noncommercial speakers that the statute was found to exceed Congress's
9148 power. The same point could have been made about noncommercial publishers
9149 after the advent of the Internet. The Eric Eldreds of the world before the
9150 Internet were extremely few. Yet one would think it at least as important to
9151 protect the Eldreds of the world as to protect noncommercial pornographers.
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2962994" href=
"#id2962994" class=
"para">180</a>]
</sup>
9154 The full text is: "Sonny [Bono] wanted the term of copyright protection to
9155 last forever. I am informed by staff that such a change would violate the
9156 Constitution. I invite all of you to work with me to strengthen our
9157 copyright laws in all of the ways available to us. As you know, there is
9158 also Jack Valenti's proposal for a term to last forever less one
9159 day. Perhaps the Committee may look at that next Congress,"
144
9160 Cong. Rec. H9946,
9951-
2 (October
7,
1998).
9161 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963220" href=
"#id2963220" class=
"para">181</a>]
</sup>
9163 Associated Press, "Disney Lobbying for Copyright Extension No Mickey Mouse
9164 Effort; Congress OKs Bill Granting Creators
20 More Years,"
9165 <em class=
"citetitle">Chicago Tribune
</em>,
17 October
1998,
22.
9166 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963235" href=
"#id2963235" class=
"para">182</a>]
</sup>
9168 Se Nick Brown, "Fair Use No More?: Copyright in the Information Age,"
9169 tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
9171 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963251" href=
"#id2963251" class=
"para">183</a>]
</sup>
9174 Alan K. Ota, "Disney in Washington: The Mouse That Roars,"
9175 <em class=
"citetitle">Congressional Quarterly This Week
</em>,
8 August
1990,
9176 available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
50</a>.
9177 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963351" href=
"#id2963351" class=
"para">184</a>]
</sup>
9179 <em class=
"citetitle">United States
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Lopez
</em>,
514
9180 U.S.
549,
564 (
1995).
9181 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963377" href=
"#id2963377" class=
"para">185</a>]
</sup>
9184 <em class=
"citetitle">United States
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Morrison
</em>,
529
9186 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963398" href=
"#id2963398" class=
"para">186</a>]
</sup>
9189 If it is a principle about enumerated powers, then the principle carries
9190 from one enumerated power to another. The animating point in the context of
9191 the Commerce Clause was that the interpretation offered by the government
9192 would allow the government unending power to regulate commerce
—the
9193 limitation to interstate commerce notwithstanding. The same point is true in
9194 the context of the Copyright Clause. Here, too, the government's
9195 interpretation would allow the government unending power to regulate
9196 copyrights
—the limitation to "limited times" notwithstanding.
9197 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963477" href=
"#id2963477" class=
"para">187</a>]
</sup>
9200 Brief of the Nashville Songwriters Association,
9201 <em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em> v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Ashcroft
</em>,
537 U.S.
9202 186 (
2003) (No.
01-
618), n
.10, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
51</a>.
9203 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963536" href=
"#id2963536" class=
"para">188</a>]
</sup>
9205 The figure of
2 percent is an extrapolation from the study by the
9206 Congressional Research Service, in light of the estimated renewal
9207 ranges. See Brief of Petitioners,
<em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em>
9208 v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Ashcroft
</em>,
7, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
52</a>.
9209 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963680" href=
"#id2963680" class=
"para">189</a>]
</sup>
9212 See David G. Savage, "High Court Scene of Showdown on Copyright Law,"
9213 <em class=
"citetitle">Los Angeles Times
</em>,
6 October
2002; David Streitfeld,
9214 "Classic Movies, Songs, Books at Stake; Supreme Court Hears Arguments Today
9215 on Striking Down Copyright Extension,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Orlando Sentinel
9216 Tribune
</em>,
9 October
2002.
9217 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963734" href=
"#id2963734" class=
"para">190</a>]
</sup>
9220 Brief of Hal Roach Studios and Michael Agee as Amicus Curiae Supporting the
9221 Petitoners,
<em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em>
9222 v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Ashcroft
</em>,
537 U.S.
186 (
2003) (No.
01-
618),
9223 12. See also Brief of Amicus Curiae filed on behalf of Petitioners by the
9224 Internet Archive,
<em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em>
9225 v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Ashcroft
</em>, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
53</a>.
9226 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2963964" href=
"#id2963964" class=
"para">191</a>]
</sup>
9229 Jason Schultz, "The Myth of the
1976 Copyright `Chaos' Theory,"
20 December
9230 2002, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
9232 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2964401" href=
"#id2964401" class=
"para">192</a>]
</sup>
9235 Brief of Amici Dr. Seuss Enterprise et al.,
<em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em>
9236 v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Ashcroft
</em>,
537 U.S. (
2003) (No.
01-
618),
19.
9237 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2964426" href=
"#id2964426" class=
"para">193</a>]
</sup>
9240 Dinitia Smith, "Immortal Words, Immortal Royalties? Even Mickey Mouse Joins
9241 the Fray,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New York Times
</em>,
28 March
1998, B7.
9242 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 15. Kapittel fjorten: Eldred II"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"eldred-ii"></a>Kapittel
15. Kapittel fjorten: Eldred II
</h2></div></div></div><p>
9243 The day
<em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em> was decided, fate would have it that I
9244 was to travel to Washington, D.C. (The day the rehearing petition in
9245 <em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em> was denied
—meaning the case was really
9246 finally over
—fate would have it that I was giving a speech to
9247 technologists at Disney World.) This was a particularly long flight to my
9248 least favorite city. The drive into the city from Dulles was delayed because
9249 of traffic, so I opened up my computer and wrote an op-ed piece.
9250 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965287"></a><p>
9251 It was an act of contrition. During the whole of the flight from San
9252 Francisco to Washington, I had heard over and over again in my head the same
9253 advice from Don Ayer: You need to make them see why it is important. And
9254 alternating with that command was the question of Justice Kennedy: "For all
9255 these years the act has impeded progress in science and the useful arts. I
9256 just don't see any empirical evidence for that." And so, having failed in
9257 the argument of constitutional principle, finally, I turned to an argument
9261 <em class=
"citetitle">The New York Times
</em> published the piece. In it, I
9262 proposed a simple fix: Fifty years after a work has been published, the
9263 copyright owner would be required to register the work and pay a small
9264 fee. If he paid the fee, he got the benefit of the full term of
9265 copyright. If he did not, the work passed into the public domain.
9267 We called this the Eldred Act, but that was just to give it a name. Eric
9268 Eldred was kind enough to let his name be used once again, but as he said
9269 early on, it won't get passed unless it has another name.
9271 Or another two names. For depending upon your perspective, this is either
9272 the "Public Domain Enhancement Act" or the "Copyright Term Deregulation
9273 Act." Either way, the essence of the idea is clear and obvious: Remove
9274 copyright where it is doing nothing except blocking access and the spread of
9275 knowledge. Leave it for as long as Congress allows for those works where its
9276 worth is at least $
1. But for everything else, let the content go.
9277 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965344"></a><p>
9278 The reaction to this idea was amazingly strong. Steve Forbes endorsed it in
9279 an editorial. I received an avalanche of e-mail and letters expressing
9280 support. When you focus the issue on lost creativity, people can see the
9281 copyright system makes no sense. As a good Republican might say, here
9282 government regulation is simply getting in the way of innovation and
9283 creativity. And as a good Democrat might say, here the government is
9284 blocking access and the spread of knowledge for no good reason. Indeed,
9285 there is no real difference between Democrats and Republicans on this
9286 issue. Anyone can recognize the stupid harm of the present system.
9288 Indeed, many recognized the obvious benefit of the registration
9289 requirement. For one of the hardest things about the current system for
9290 people who want to license content is that there is no obvious place to look
9291 for the current copyright owners. Since registration is not required, since
9292 marking content is not required, since no formality at all is required, it
9293 is often impossibly hard to locate copyright owners to ask permission to use
9294 or license their work. This system would lower these costs, by establishing
9295 at least one registry where copyright owners could be identified.
9296 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965377"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965383"></a><p>
9298 As I described in chapter
10, formalities in copyright law were removed in
9299 1976, when Congress followed the Europeans by abandoning any formal
9300 requirement before a copyright is granted.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2965395" href=
"#ftn.id2965395" class=
"footnote">194</a>]
</sup> The Europeans are said to view copyright as a "natural right."
9301 Natural rights don't need forms to exist. Traditions, like the
9302 Anglo-American tradition that required copyright owners to follow form if
9303 their rights were to be protected, did not, the Europeans thought, properly
9304 respect the dignity of the author. My right as a creator turns on my
9305 creativity, not upon the special favor of the government.
9307 That's great rhetoric. It sounds wonderfully romantic. But it is absurd
9308 copyright policy. It is absurd especially for authors, because a world
9309 without formalities harms the creator. The ability to spread "Walt Disney
9310 creativity" is destroyed when there is no simple way to know what's
9311 protected and what's not.
9312 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965443"></a><p>
9313 The fight against formalities achieved its first real victory in Berlin in
9314 1908. International copyright lawyers amended the Berne Convention in
1908,
9315 to require copyright terms of life plus fifty years, as well as the
9316 abolition of copyright formalities. The formalities were hated because the
9317 stories of inadvertent loss were increasingly common. It was as if a Charles
9318 Dickens character ran all copyright offices, and the failure to dot an
9319 <em class=
"citetitle">i
</em> or cross a
<em class=
"citetitle">t
</em> resulted in the
9320 loss of widows' only income.
9322 These complaints were real and sensible. And the strictness of the
9323 formalities, especially in the United States, was absurd. The law should
9324 always have ways of forgiving innocent mistakes. There is no reason
9325 copyright law couldn't, as well. Rather than abandoning formalities totally,
9326 the response in Berlin should have been to embrace a more equitable system
9329 Even that would have been resisted, however, because registration in the
9330 nineteenth and twentieth centuries was still expensive. It was also a
9331 hassle. The abolishment of formalities promised not only to save the
9332 starving widows, but also to lighten an unnecessary regulatory burden
9333 imposed upon creators.
9336 In addition to the practical complaint of authors in
1908, there was a moral
9337 claim as well. There was no reason that creative property should be a
9338 second-class form of property. If a carpenter builds a table, his rights
9339 over the table don't depend upon filing a form with the government. He has
9340 a property right over the table "naturally," and he can assert that right
9341 against anyone who would steal the table, whether or not he has informed the
9342 government of his ownership of the table.
9344 This argument is correct, but its implications are misleading. For the
9345 argument in favor of formalities does not depend upon creative property
9346 being second-class property. The argument in favor of formalities turns upon
9347 the special problems that creative property presents. The law of
9348 formalities responds to the special physics of creative property, to assure
9349 that it can be efficiently and fairly spread.
9351 No one thinks, for example, that land is second-class property just because
9352 you have to register a deed with a court if your sale of land is to be
9353 effective. And few would think a car is second-class property just because
9354 you must register the car with the state and tag it with a license. In both
9355 of those cases, everyone sees that there is an important reason to secure
9356 registration
—both because it makes the markets more efficient and
9357 because it better secures the rights of the owner. Without a registration
9358 system for land, landowners would perpetually have to guard their
9359 property. With registration, they can simply point the police to a
9360 deed. Without a registration system for cars, auto theft would be much
9361 easier. With a registration system, the thief has a high burden to sell a
9362 stolen car. A slight burden is placed on the property owner, but those
9363 burdens produce a much better system of protection for property generally.
9365 It is similarly special physics that makes formalities important in
9366 copyright law. Unlike a carpenter's table, there's nothing in nature that
9367 makes it relatively obvious who might own a particular bit of creative
9368 property. A recording of Lyle Lovett's latest album can exist in a billion
9369 places without anything necessarily linking it back to a particular
9370 owner. And like a car, there's no way to buy and sell creative property with
9371 confidence unless there is some simple way to authenticate who is the author
9372 and what rights he has. Simple transactions are destroyed in a world without
9373 formalities. Complex, expensive,
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>lawyer
</em></span> transactions
9374 take their place.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965517"></a>
9376 This was the understanding of the problem with the Sonny Bono Act that we
9377 tried to demonstrate to the Court. This was the part it didn't "get."
9378 Because we live in a system without formalities, there is no way easily to
9379 build upon or use culture from our past. If copyright terms were, as Justice
9380 Story said they would be, "short," then this wouldn't matter much. For
9381 fourteen years, under the framers' system, a work would be presumptively
9382 controlled. After fourteen years, it would be presumptively uncontrolled.
9384 But now that copyrights can be just about a century long, the inability to
9385 know what is protected and what is not protected becomes a huge and obvious
9386 burden on the creative process. If the only way a library can offer an
9387 Internet exhibit about the New Deal is to hire a lawyer to clear the rights
9388 to every image and sound, then the copyright system is burdening creativity
9389 in a way that has never been seen before
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>because there are no
9390 formalities
</em></span>.
9392 The Eldred Act was designed to respond to exactly this problem. If it is
9393 worth $
1 to you, then register your work and you can get the longer
9394 term. Others will know how to contact you and, therefore, how to get your
9395 permission if they want to use your work. And you will get the benefit of an
9396 extended copyright term.
9398 If it isn't worth it to you to register to get the benefit of an extended
9399 term, then it shouldn't be worth it for the government to defend your
9400 monopoly over that work either. The work should pass into the public domain
9401 where anyone can copy it, or build archives with it, or create a movie based
9402 on it. It should become free if it is not worth $
1 to you.
9404 Noen bekymrer seg over byrden på forfattere. Gjør ikke byrden med å
9405 registrere verket at beløpet $
1 egentlig er misvisende? Er ikke
9406 ekstraarbeidet verdt mer enn $
1? Er ikke dette det virkelige problemet med
9410 It is. The hassle is terrible. The system that exists now is awful. I
9411 completely agree that the Copyright Office has done a terrible job (no doubt
9412 because they are terribly funded) in enabling simple and cheap
9413 registrations. Any real solution to the problem of formalities must address
9414 the real problem of
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>governments
</em></span> standing at the core of
9415 any system of formalities. In this book, I offer such a solution. That
9416 solution essentially remakes the Copyright Office. For now, assume it was
9417 Amazon that ran the registration system. Assume it was one-click
9418 registration. The Eldred Act would propose a simple, one-click registration
9419 fifty years after a work was published. Based upon historical data, that
9420 system would move up to
98 percent of commercial work, commercial work that
9421 no longer had a commercial life, into the public domain within fifty
9422 years. What do you think?
9423 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965631"></a><p>
9424 Da Steve Forbes støttet idéen, begynte enkelte i Washington å følge
9425 med. Mange kontaktet meg med tips til representanter som kan være villig til
9426 å introdusere en Eldred-lov. og jeg hadde noen få som foreslo direkte at de
9427 kan være villige til å ta det første skrittet.
9429 En representant, Zoe Lofgren fra California, gikk så langt som å få
9430 lovforslaget utarbeidet. Utkastet løste noen problemer med internasjonal
9431 lov. Det påla de enklest mulige forutsetninger på innehaverne av
9432 opphavsretter. I mai
2003 så det ut som om loven skulle være introdusert.
9433 16. mai, postet jeg på Eldred Act-bloggen, "vi er nære". Det oppstod en
9434 generell reaksjon i blogg-samfunnet om at noe godt kunne skje her.
9435 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965664"></a>
9437 But at this stage, the lobbyists began to intervene. Jack Valenti and the
9438 MPAA general counsel came to the congresswoman's office to give the view of
9439 the MPAA. Aided by his lawyer, as Valenti told me, Valenti informed the
9440 congresswoman that the MPAA would oppose the Eldred Act. The reasons are
9441 embarrassingly thin. More importantly, their thinness shows something clear
9442 about what this debate is really about.
9445 The MPAA argued first that Congress had "firmly rejected the central concept
9446 in the proposed bill"
—that copyrights be renewed. That was true, but
9447 irrelevant, as Congress's "firm rejection" had occurred long before the
9448 Internet made subsequent uses much more likely. Second, they argued that
9449 the proposal would harm poor copyright owners
—apparently those who
9450 could not afford the $
1 fee. Third, they argued that Congress had determined
9451 that extending a copyright term would encourage restoration work. Maybe in
9452 the case of the small percentage of work covered by copyright law that is
9453 still commercially valuable, but again this was irrelevant, as the proposal
9454 would not cut off the extended term unless the $
1 fee was not paid. Fourth,
9455 the MPAA argued that the bill would impose "enormous" costs, since a
9456 registration system is not free. True enough, but those costs are certainly
9457 less than the costs of clearing the rights for a copyright whose owner is
9458 not known. Fifth, they worried about the risks if the copyright to a story
9459 underlying a film were to pass into the public domain. But what risk is
9460 that? If it is in the public domain, then the film is a valid derivative
9463 Finally, the MPAA argued that existing law enabled copyright owners to do
9464 this if they wanted. But the whole point is that there are thousands of
9465 copyright owners who don't even know they have a copyright to give. Whether
9466 they are free to give away their copyright or not
—a controversial
9467 claim in any case
—unless they know about a copyright, they're not
9470 At the beginning of this book, I told two stories about the law reacting to
9471 changes in technology. In the one, common sense prevailed. In the other,
9472 common sense was delayed. The difference between the two stories was the
9473 power of the opposition
—the power of the side that fought to defend
9474 the status quo. In both cases, a new technology threatened old
9475 interests. But in only one case did those interest's have the power to
9476 protect themselves against this new competitive threat.
9478 Jeg brukte disse to tilfellene som en måte å ramme inn krigen som denne
9479 boken har handlet om. For her er det også en ny teknologi som tvinger loven
9480 til å reagere. Og her bør vi også spørre, er loven i tråd med eller i strid
9481 med sunn fornuft. Hvis sunn fornuft støtter loven, hva forklarer denne
9487 When the issue is piracy, it is right for the law to back the copyright
9488 owners. The commercial piracy that I described is wrong and harmful, and the
9489 law should work to eliminate it. When the issue is p2p sharing, it is easy
9490 to understand why the law backs the owners still: Much of this sharing is
9491 wrong, even if much is harmless. When the issue is copyright terms for the
9492 Mickey Mouses of the world, it is possible still to understand why the law
9493 favors Hollywood: Most people don't recognize the reasons for limiting
9494 copyright terms; it is thus still possible to see good faith within the
9497 But when the copyright owners oppose a proposal such as the Eldred Act,
9498 then, finally, there is an example that lays bare the naked selfinterest
9499 driving this war. This act would free an extraordinary range of content that
9500 is otherwise unused. It wouldn't interfere with any copyright owner's desire
9501 to exercise continued control over his content. It would simply liberate
9502 what Kevin Kelly calls the "Dark Content" that fills archives around the
9503 world. So when the warriors oppose a change like this, we should ask one
9506 Hva ønsker denne industrien egentlig?
9508 With very little effort, the warriors could protect their content. So the
9509 effort to block something like the Eldred Act is not really about protecting
9510 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>their
</em></span> content. The effort to block the Eldred Act is an
9511 effort to assure that nothing more passes into the public domain. It is
9512 another step to assure that the public domain will never compete, that there
9513 will be no use of content that is not commercially controlled, and that
9514 there will be no commercial use of content that doesn't require
9515 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>their
</em></span> permission first.
9517 The opposition to the Eldred Act reveals how extreme the other side is. The
9518 most powerful and sexy and well loved of lobbies really has as its aim not
9519 the protection of "property" but the rejection of a tradition. Their aim is
9520 not simply to protect what is theirs.
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>Their aim is to assure that
9521 all there is is what is theirs
</em></span>.
9524 It is not hard to understand why the warriors take this view. It is not hard
9525 to see why it would benefit them if the competition of the public domain
9526 tied to the Internet could somehow be quashed. Just as RCA feared the
9527 competition of FM, they fear the competition of a public domain connected to
9528 a public that now has the means to create with it and to share its own
9530 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965817"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965824"></a><p>
9531 What is hard to understand is why the public takes this view. It is as if
9532 the law made airplanes trespassers. The MPAA stands with the Causbys and
9533 demands that their remote and useless property rights be respected, so that
9534 these remote and forgotten copyright holders might block the progress of
9537 All this seems to follow easily from this untroubled acceptance of the
9538 "property" in intellectual property. Common sense supports it, and so long
9539 as it does, the assaults will rain down upon the technologies of the
9540 Internet. The consequence will be an increasing "permission society." The
9541 past can be cultivated only if you can identify the owner and gain
9542 permission to build upon his work. The future will be controlled by this
9543 dead (and often unfindable) hand of the past.
9544 </p><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2965395" href=
"#id2965395" class=
"para">194</a>]
</sup>
9547 Until the
1908 Berlin Act of the Berne Convention, national copyright
9548 legislation sometimes made protection depend upon compliance with
9549 formalities such as registration, deposit, and affixation of notice of the
9550 author's claim of copyright. However, starting with the
1908 act, every text
9551 of the Convention has provided that "the enjoyment and the exercise" of
9552 rights guaranteed by the Convention "shall not be subject to any formality."
9553 The prohibition against formalities is presently embodied in Article
5(
2) of
9554 the Paris Text of the Berne Convention. Many countries continue to impose
9555 some form of deposit or registration requirement, albeit not as a condition
9556 of copyright. French law, for example, requires the deposit of copies of
9557 works in national repositories, principally the National Museum. Copies of
9558 books published in the United Kingdom must be deposited in the British
9559 Library. The German Copyright Act provides for a Registrar of Authors where
9560 the author's true name can be filed in the case of anonymous or pseudonymous
9561 works. Paul Goldstein,
<em class=
"citetitle">International Intellectual Property Law,
9562 Cases and Materials
</em> (New York: Foundation Press,
2001),
9563 153–54.
</p></div></div></div></div><div class=
"part" title=
"Del V. Konklusjon"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h1 class=
"title"><a name=
"c-conclusion"></a>Del V. Konklusjon
</h1></div></div></div><div class=
"partintro" title=
"Konklusjon"><div></div><p>
9564 Det er mer enn trettifem millioner mennesker over hele verden med
9565 AIDS-viruset. Tjuefem millioner av dem bor i Afrika sør for Sahara. Sytten
9566 millioner har allerede dødd. Sytten millioner afrikanere er prosentvis
9567 proporsjonalt med syv millioner amerikanere. Viktigere er det at dette er
9568 17 millioner afrikanere.
9570 Det finnes ingen kur for AIDS, men det finnes medisiner som kan hemme
9571 sykdommens utvikling. Disse antiretrovirale terapiene er fortsatt
9572 eksperimentelle, men de har hatt en dramatisk effekt allerede. I USA øker
9573 AIDS-pasienter som regelmessig tar en cocktail av disse medisinene sin
9574 levealder med ti til tjue år. For noen gjøre medisinene sykdommen nesten
9577 Disse medisinene er dyre. Da de ble først introdusert i USA, kostet de
9578 mellom $
10 000 og $
15 000 pr. person hvert år. I dag koster noen av dem $
25
9579 000 pr. år. Med disse prisene har, selvfølgelig, ingen afrikansk stat råd
9580 til medisinen for det store flertall av sine innbyggere: $
15 000 er tredve
9581 ganger brutto nasjonalprodukt pr. innbygger i Zimbabwe. Med slike priser er
9582 disse medisinene fullstendig utilgjengelig.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2965906" href=
"#ftn.id2965906" class=
"footnote">195</a>]
</sup>
9586 Disse prisene er ikke høye fordi ingrediensene til medisinene er dyre.
9587 Disse prisene er høye fordi medisinene er beskyttet av patenter.
9588 Farmasiselskapene som produserer disse livreddende blandingene nyter minst
9589 tjue års monopol på sine oppfinnelser. De bruker denne monopolmakten til å
9590 hente ut så mye de kan fra markedet. Ved hjelp av denne makten holder de
9593 Det er mange som er skeptiske til patenter, spesielt patenter på
9594 medisiner. Det er ikke jeg. Faktisk av alle forskningsområder som kan være
9595 støttet av patenter, er forskning på medisiner, etter min mening, det
9596 klareste tilfelle der patenter er nødvendig. Patenter gir et farmasøytiske
9597 firma en viss forsikring om at hvis det lykkes i å finne opp et nytt
9598 medikament som kan behandle en sykdom, vil det kunne tjene tilbake
9599 investeringen og mer til. Dette ber sosialt et ekstremt verdifullt
9600 insentiv. Jeg er den siste personen som vil argumentere for at loven skal
9601 avskaffe dette, i det minste uten andre endringer.
9603 Men det er én ting å støtte patenter, selv patenter på medisiner. Det er en
9604 annen ting å avgjøre hvordan en best skal håndtere en krise. Og i det
9605 afrikanske ledere begynte å erkjenne ødeleggelsen AIDS brakte, begynte de å
9606 se etter måter å importere HIV-medisiner til kostnader betydelig under
9609 I
1997 forsøkte Sør-Afrika seg på en tilnærming. Landet vedtok en lov som
9610 tillot import av patenterte medisiner som hadde blitt produsert og solgt i
9611 en annen nasjons marked med godkjenning fra patenteieren. For eksempel,
9612 hvis medisinen var solgt i India, så kunne den bli importert inn til Afrika
9613 fra India. Dette kalles "parallellimport" og er generelt tillatt i
9614 internasjonal handelslovgivning, og spesifikt tillatt i den europeiske
9615 union.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2965984" href=
"#ftn.id2965984" class=
"footnote">196</a>]
</sup>
9617 Men USA var imot lovendringen. Og de nøyde seg ikke med å være imot. Som
9618 International Intellectual Property Association karakteriserte det,
9619 "Myndighetene i USA presset Sør-Afrika . . . til å ikke tillate tvungen
9620 lisensiering eller parallellimport"
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2966020" href=
"#ftn.id2966020" class=
"footnote">197</a>]
</sup>
9621 Gjennom kontoret til USAs handelsrepresentant (USTR), ba myndighetene
9622 Sør-Afrika om å endre loven
—og for å legge press bak den
9623 forespørselen, listet USTR i
1998 opp Sør-Afrika som et land som burde
9624 vurderes for handelsrestriksjoner. Samme år gikk mer enn førti
9625 farmasiselskaper til retten for å utfordre myndighetenes handlinger. USA
9626 fikk selskap av andre myndigheter fra EU. Deres påstand, og påstanden til
9627 farmasiselskapene, var at Sør-Afrika brøt sine internasjonale forpliktelser
9628 ved å distriminere mot en bestemt type patenter
—farmasøytiske
9629 patenter. Kravet fra disse myndighetene, med USA i spissen, var at
9630 Sør-Afrika skulle respektere disse patentene på samme måte som alle andre
9631 patenter, uavhengig av eventuell effekt på behandlingen av AIDS i
9632 Sør-Afrika.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2966049" href=
"#ftn.id2966049" class=
"footnote">198</a>]
</sup>
9634 Vi bør sette intervensjonen til USA i sammenheng. Det er ingen tvil om at
9635 patenter ikke er den viktigste årsaken til at Afrikanere ikke har tilgang
9636 til medisiner. Fattigdom og den totale mangel på effektivt helsevesen betyr
9637 mer. Men uansett om patenter er en viktigste grunnen eller ikke, så har
9638 prisen på medisiner en effekt på etterspørselen, og patenter påvirker
9639 prisen. Så uansett, massiv eller marginal, så var det en effekt av våre
9640 myndigheters intervensjon for å stoppe flyten av medisiner inn til Afrika.
9642 Ved å stoppe flyten av HIV-behandling til Afrika, sikret ikke myndighetene i
9643 USA medisiner til USA borgere. Dette er ikke som hvete (hvis de spise det så
9644 kan ikke vi spise det). Det som USA i effekt intervenerte for å stoppe, var
9645 flyten av kunnskap: Informasjon om hvordan en kan ta kjemikalier som finnes
9646 i Afrika og gjøre disse kjemikaliene om til medisiner som kan redde
15 til
9649 Intervensjonen fra USA ville heller ikke beskytte fortjenesten til
9650 medisinselskapene i USA
— i hvert fall ikke betydelig. Det var jo ikke
9651 slik at disse landene hadde mulighet til å kjøpe medisinene til de prisene
9652 som medisinselskapene forlangte. Igjen var afrikanerne for fattige til å ha
9653 råd til disse medisinene til de tilbudte prisene. Å blokkere for
9654 parallellimport av disse medisinene ville ikke øke salget til de amerikanske
9655 selskapene betydelig.
9657 I stedet var argumentet til fordel for restriksjoner på denne flyten av
9658 informasjon, som var nødvendig for å redde millioner av liv, et argument om
9659 eiendoms ukrenkelighet.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2966143" href=
"#ftn.id2966143" class=
"footnote">199</a>]
</sup> Det var på
9660 grunn av at "intellektuell eiendom" ville bli krenket at disse medisinene
9661 ikke skulle flomme inn til Afrika. Det var prinsippet om viktigheten av
9662 "intellektuell eiendom" som fikk disse myndighetsaktørene til å intervenere
9663 mot Sør-Afrikas mottiltak mot AIDS.
9665 La oss ta et skritt tilbake for et øyeblikk. En gang om tredve år vil våre
9666 barn se tilbake på oss og spørre, hvordan kunne vi la dette skje? Hvordan
9667 kunne vi tillate å gjennomføre en politikk hvis direkte kostnad var få
15
9668 til
30 millioner afrikanere til å dø raskere, og hvis eneste virkelige
9669 fordel var å opprettholde "ukrenkeligheten" til en idé? Hva slags
9670 berettigelse kan noen sinne eksistere for en politikk som resulterer i så
9671 mange døde? Hva slags galskap er det egentlig som tillater at så mange dør
9672 for slik en abstraksjon?
9674 Noen skylder på farmasiselskapene. Det gjør ikke jeg. De er selskaper, og
9675 deres ledere er lovpålagt å tjene penger for selskapene. De presser på for
9676 en bestemt patentpolitikk, ikke på grunn av idealer, men fordi det er dette
9677 som gjør at de tjener mest penger. Og dette gjør kun at de tjener mest
9678 penger på grunn av en slags korrupsjon i vårt politiske system
— en
9679 korrupsjon som farmasiselskapene helt klart ikke er ansvarlige for.
9681 Denne korrupsjonen er våre egne politikeres manglende integritet. For
9682 medisinprodusentene ville elske
—sier de selv, og jeg tror dem
—
9683 å selge sine medisiner så billig som de kan til land i Afrika og andre
9684 steder. Det er utfordringer de må løse å sikre at medisinene ikke kommer
9685 tilbake til USA, men dette er bare teknologiske utfordring. De kan bli
9689 Et annet problem kan derimot ikke løses. Det er frykten for at en politiker
9690 som skal vise seg og kaller inn lederne hos medisinprodusentene til høring i
9691 senatet eller representantenes hus og spør, "hvordan har det seg at du kan
9692 selge HIV-medisinen i Afrika for bare $
1 pr. pille, mens samme pille koster
9693 en amerikansker $
1500?" Da det ikke finnes et "kjapt svar" på det
9694 spørsmålet, ville effekten bli regulering av priser i Amerika.
9695 Medisinprodusentene unngård dermed denne spiralen ved å sikre at det første
9696 steget ikke tas. De forsterker idéen om at eierrettigheter skal være
9697 ukrenkelige. De legger seg på en rasjonell strategi i en irrasjonell
9698 omgivelse, med den utilsiktede konsekvens at kanskje millioner dør. Og den
9699 rasjonelle strategien rammes dermed inn ved hjel av dette
9700 ideal
—helligheten til en idé som kalles "immaterielle rettigheter".
9702 Så når du konfronteres av ditt barns sunne fornuft, hva vil du si? Når den
9703 sunne fornuften hos en generasjon endelig gjør opprør mot hva vi har gjort,
9704 hvordan vil vi rettferdiggjøre det? Hva er argumentet?
9706 En fornuftig patentpolitikk kunne gå god for og gi sterk støtte til
9707 patentsystemet uten å måtte nå alle overalt på nøyaktig samme måte. På samme
9708 måte som en fornuftig opphavsrettspolitikk kunne gå god for og gi sterk
9709 støtte til et opphavsretts-system uten å måtte regulere spredningen av
9710 kultur perfekt og for alltid. En fornuftig patentpolitikk kunne gå god for
9711 og gi sterk støtte til et patentsystem uten å måtte blokkere spredning av
9712 medisiner til et land som uansett ikke er rikt nok til å ha råd til
9713 markedsprisen. En fornuftig politikk kan en dermed si kunne være en
9714 balansert politikk. For det meste av vår historie har både opphavsrett- og
9715 patentpolitikken i denne forstand vært balansert.
9718 Men vi som kultur har mistet denne følelsen for balanse. Vi har mistet det
9719 kritiske blikket som hjelper oss til å se forkjellen mellom sannhet og
9720 ekstremisme. En slags eiendomsfundamentalisme, uten grunnlag i vår
9721 tradisjon, hersker nå i vår kultur
—sært, og med konsekvenser mer
9722 alvorlig for spredningen av idéer og kultur enn nesten enhver annen politisk
9723 enkeltavgjørelse vi som demokrati kan fatte. En enkel idé blender oss, og
9724 under dekke av mørket skjer mye som de fleste av oss ville avvist hvis vi
9725 hadde fulgt med. Så ukritisk aksepterer vi idéen om eierskap til idéer at
9726 vi ikke engang legger merke til hvor uhyrlig det er å nekte tilgang til
9727 idéer for et folk som dør uten dem. Så ukritisk aksepterer vi idéen om
9728 eiendom til kulturen at vi ikke engang stiller spørsmål ved når kontrollen
9729 over denne eiendommen fjerner vår evne, som folk, til å utvikle vår kultur
9730 demokratisk. Blindhet blir vår sunne fornuft, og utfordringen for enhver
9731 som vil gjenvinne retten til å dyrke vår kultur er å finne en måte å få
9732 denne sunne fornuften til å åpne sine øyne.
9734 Så langt sover sunn fornuft. Det er intet opprør. Sunn fornuft ser ennå
9735 ikke hva det er å gjøre opprør mot. Ekstremismen som nå domunerer denne
9736 debatten resonerer med idéer som virker naturlige, og resonansen er
9737 forsterket av våre moderne RCA-ene. De fører en frenetisk krig for å
9738 bekjempe "piratvirksomhet" og knuser kreativitetskultur. De forsvarer idéen
9739 om "kreativt eierskap", mens de endrer ekte skapere til moderne
9740 leilendinger. De blir fornermet av idéen om at rettigheter skulle være
9741 balanserte, selv om hver av hovedaktørene i denne innholdskrigen selv hadde
9742 fordeler av et mer balansert ideal. Hykleriet rår. Men i en by som
9743 Washington blir ikke hykleriet en gang lakt merke til. Mektige lobbyister,
9744 kompliserte problemer og MTV-oppmerksomhetsspenn gir en "perfekt storm" for
9747 I august
2003 brøt en kamp ut i USA om en avgjørelse fra World Intellectual
9748 Property Organiation om å avlyse et møte.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2966268" href=
"#ftn.id2966268" class=
"footnote">200</a>]
</sup> På forespørsel fra en lang rekke med interresenter hadde WIPO
9749 bestemt å avholde et møte for å diskutere "åpne og sammarbeidende prosjekter
9750 for å skape goder for felleskapet". Disse prosjektene som hadde lyktes i å
9751 produsere goder for fellesskapet uten å basere seg eksklusivt på bruken av
9752 proprietære immaterielle rettigheter. Eksempler inkluderer internettet og
9753 verdensveven, begge som ble utviklet på grunnlag av protokoller i
9754 allemannseie. Det hadde med en begynnende trend for å støtte åpne
9755 akademiske tidsskrifter, og inkluderte Public Library of Science-prosjektet
9756 som jeg beskriver i etterordet. Det inkluderte et prosjekt for a utvikle
9757 enkeltnukleotidforskjeller (SNPs), som er antatt å få stor betydning i
9758 biomedisinsk forskning. (Dette ideelle prosjektet besto av et konsortium av
9759 Wellcome Trust og farmasøytiske og teknologiske selskaper, inkludert
9760 Amersham Biosciences, AstraZeneca, Aventis, Bayer, Bristol-Myers Squibb,
9761 Hoffmann-La Roche, Glaxo-SmithKline, IBM, Motorola, Novartis, Pfizer, og
9762 Searle.) Det inkluderte Globalt posisjonssystem (GPS) som Ronald Reagen
9763 frigjorde tidlig på
1980-tallet. Og det inkluderte "åpen kildekode og fri
9764 programvare".
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2966445"></a>
9766 Formålet med møtet var å vurdere denne rekken av prosjekter fra et felles
9767 perspektiv: at ingen av disse prosjektene hadde som grunnlag immateriell
9768 ekstremisme. I stedet, hos alle disse, ble immaterielle rettigheter
9769 balansert med avtaler om å holde tilgang åpen, eller for å legge
9770 begrensninger på hvordan proprietære krav kan bli brukt.
9772 Dermed var, fra perspektivet i denne boken, denne konferansen
9773 ideell.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2966472" href=
"#ftn.id2966472" class=
"footnote">201</a>]
</sup> Prosjektene innenfor temaet var
9774 både kommersielle og ikkekommersielle verker. De involverte i hovedsak
9775 vitenskapet, men fra mange perspektiver. Og WIPO var et ideelt sted for
9776 denne diskusjonen, siden WIPO var den fremstående internasjonale aktør som
9777 drev med immaterielle rettighetsspørsmål.
9780 Faktisk fikk jeg en gang offentlig kjeft for å ikke anerkjenne dette faktum
9781 om WIPO. I februar
2003 leverte jeg et hovedinnlegg på en forberedende
9782 konferanse for World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). På en
9783 pressekonferanse før innlegget, ble jeg spurt hva jeg skulle snakke om. Jeg
9784 svarte at jeg skulle snakke litt om viktigheten av balanse rundt
9785 immaterielle verdier for utviklingen av informasjonssamfunnet. Ordstyreren
9786 på arrangementet avbrøt meg da brått for å informere meg og journalistene
9787 tilstede at ingen spørsmål rundt immaterielle verdier ville bli diskutert av
9788 WSIS, da slike spørsmål kun skulle diskuteres i WIPO. I innlegget jeg hadde
9789 forberedt var temaet om immaterielle verdier en forholdvis liten del av det
9790 hele. Men etter denne forbløffende uttalelsen, gjorde jeg immaterielle
9791 verdier til hovedfokus for mitt innlegg. Det var ikke mulig å snakke om et
9792 "informasjonssamfunn" uten at en også snakket om andelen av informasjon og
9793 kultur som ikke er vernet av opphavsretten. Mitt innlegg gjorde ikke min
9794 overivrige moderator veldig glad. Og hun hadde uten tvil rett i at omfanget
9795 til vern av immaterielle rettigheter normalt hørte inn under WIPO. Men
9796 etter mitt syn, kunne det ikke bli for mye diskusjon om hvor mye
9797 immaterielle rettigheter som trengs, siden etter mitt syn, hadde selve ideen
9798 om en balanse rundt immaterielle rettigheter hadde gått tapt.
9800 Så uansett om WSIS kan diskutere balanse i intellektuell eiendom eller ikke,
9801 så hadde jeg trodd det var tatt for gitt at WIPO kunne og burde. Og dermed
9802 møtet om "åpne og samarbeidende prosjekter for å skape fellesgoder" virker å
9803 passe perfekt for WIPOs agenda.
9805 Men det er ett prosjekt i listen som er svært kontroversielt, i hvert fall
9806 blant lobbyister. Dette prosjektet er "åpen kildekode og fri
9807 programvare". Microsoft spesielt er skeptisk til diskusjon om emnet. Fra
9808 deres perspektiv, ville en konferanse for å diskutere åpen kildekode og fri
9809 programvare være som en konferanse for å diskutere Apples operativsystem.
9810 Både åpen kildekode og fri programvare konkurrerer med Microsofts
9811 programvare. Og internasjonalt har mange myndigheter begynt å utforske krav
9812 om at de skal bruke åpen kildekode eller fri programvare, i stedet for
9813 "proprietær programvare," til sine egne interne behov.
9815 I don't mean to enter that debate here. It is important only to make clear
9816 that the distinction is not between commercial and noncommercial
9817 software. There are many important companies that depend fundamentally upon
9818 open source and free software, IBM being the most prominent. IBM is
9819 increasingly shifting its focus to the GNU/Linux operating system, the most
9820 famous bit of "free software"
—and IBM is emphatically a commercial
9821 entity. Thus, to support "open source and free software" is not to oppose
9822 commercial entities. It is, instead, to support a mode of software
9823 development that is different from Microsoft's.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2966327" href=
"#ftn.id2966327" class=
"footnote">202</a>]
</sup> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2966611"></a>
9826 Mer viktig for våre formål, er at å støtte "åpen kildekode og fri
9827 programvare" ikke er å motsette seg opphasvrett. "Åpen kildekode og fri
9828 programvare" er ikke programvare uten opphavsrettslig vern. Istedet, på
9829 samme måte som programvare fra Microsoft, insisterer opphavsrettsinnehaverne
9830 av fri programvare ganske sterkt at vilkårene i deres programvarelisens blir
9831 respektert av de som tar i bruk fri programvare. Vilkårene i den lisensen
9832 er uten tvil forskjellig fra vilkårene i en proprietær programvarelisens.
9833 For eksempel krever fri programvare lisensiert med den generelle offentlige
9834 lisensen (GPL), at kildekoden for programvare gjøres tilgjengelig for alle
9835 som endrer og redistribuerer programvaren. Men dette kravet er kun
9836 effektivt hvis opphavsrett råder over programvare. Hvis opphavsretten ikke
9837 råder over programvare, så kunne ikke fri programvare pålegge slike krav på
9838 de som tar i bruk programvaren. Den er dermed like avhengig av
9839 opphavsrettsloven som Microsoft.
9841 Det er dermed forståelig at Microsoft, som utviklere av proprietær
9842 programvare, gikk imot et slikt WIPO-møte, og like fullt forståelig at de
9843 bruker sine lobbyister til å få USAs myndigheter til å gå imot møtet. Og
9844 ganske riktig, det er akkurat dette som i følge rapporter hadde skjedd. I
9845 følge Jonathan Krim i
<em class=
"citetitle">Washington Post
</em>, lyktes
9846 Microsofts lobbyister i å få USAs myndigheter til å legge ned veto mot et
9847 slikt møte.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2966674" href=
"#ftn.id2966674" class=
"footnote">203</a>]
</sup> Og uten støtte fra USA ble
9850 Jeg klandrer ikke Microsoft for å gjøre det de kan for å fremme sine egne
9851 interesser i samsvar med loven. Og lobbyvirksomhet mot myndighetene er
9852 åpenbart i samsvar med loven. Det er ikke noe overraskende her med deres
9853 lobbyvirksomhet, og ikke veldig overraskende at den mektigste
9854 programvareprodusenten i USA har lyktes med sin lobbyvirksomhet.
9856 Det som var overraskende var USAs regjerings begrunnelse for å være imot
9857 møtet. Igjen, siterert av krim, forklarte Lois Boland, direktør for
9858 internasjonale forbindelser ved USAs patent og varemerkekontor, at
9859 "programvare med åpen kildekode går imot til formålet til WIPO, som er å
9860 fremme immatterielle rettigheter.". Hun skal i følge sitatet ha sagt, "Å
9861 holde et møte som har som formål å fraskrive seg eller frafalle slike
9862 rettigheter synes for oss å være i strid med formålene til WIPO."
9864 Disse utsagnene er forbløffende på flere nivåer.
9866 For det første er de ganske enkelt enkelt ikke riktige. Som jeg beskrev, er
9867 det meste av åpen kildekode og fri programvare fundamentalt avhengig av den
9868 immaterielle retten kalt "opphavsrett". Uten den vil begresningene definert
9869 av disse lisensene ikke fungere. Dermed er det å si at de "går imot"
9870 formålet om å fremme immaterielle rettigheter å avsløre en ekstraordinær
9871 mangel på forståelse
—den type feil som er tilgivelig hos en førsteårs
9872 jusstudent, men pinlig fra en høyt plassert statstjenestemann som håndterer
9873 utfordringer rundt immaterielle rettigheter.
9875 For det andre, hvem har noen gang hevdet at WIPOs eksklusive mål var å
9876 "fremme" immaterielle rettigheter maksimalt? Som jeg fikk kjeft om på den
9877 forberedende konferansen til WSIS, skal WIPO vurdere ikke bare hvordan best
9878 beskytte immaterielle rettigheter, men også hva som er den beste balansen
9879 rundt immaterielle rettigheter. Som enhver økonom og advokat vet, er det
9880 vanskelige spørsmålet i immaterielle rettighetsjuss å finne den balansen.
9881 Men at det skulle være en grense, trodde jeg, var ubestridt. Man ønsker å
9882 spørre Ms. boland om generelle medisiner (medisiner basert på medisiner med
9883 patenter som er utløpt) i strid med WIPOs oppdrag? Svekker allemannseie
9884 immaterielle rettigheter? Ville det vært bedre om internettets protokoller
9885 hadde vært patentert?
9887 For det tredje, selv om en tror at formålet med WIPO var å maksimere
9888 immaterielle rettigheter, så innehas immaterielle rettigheter, i vår
9889 tradisjon, av individer og selskaper. De får bestemme hva som skal gjøres
9890 med disse rettighetene, igjen fordi det er
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>de
</em></span> som eier
9891 rettigetene. Hvis de ønsker å "frafalle" eller "frasi" seg sine rettigheter,
9892 så er det helt etter boka i vår tradisjon. Når Bill Gates gir bort mer enn
9893 $
20 milliarder til gode formål, så er ikke det uforenelig med målene til
9894 eiendomssystemet. Det er heller tvert i mot, akkurat hva eiendomssysstemet
9895 er ment å oppnå, at individer har retten til å bestemme hva de vil gjøre med
9896 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>sin
</em></span> eiendom.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2966812"></a>
9899 Når Ms. Boland sier at det er noe galt med et møte "som har som sitt formål
9900 å fraskrive eller frafalle slike rettigheter", så sier hun at WIPO har en
9901 interesse i å påvirke valgene til enkeltpersoner som eier immaterielle
9902 rettigheter. At på en eller annen WIPOs oppdrag bør være å stoppe individer
9903 fra å "frakrive" eller "frafalle" seg sine immaterielle rettigheter. At
9904 interessen til WIPO ikke bare er maksimale immaterielle rettigheter, men
9905 også at de skal utøves på den mest ekstreme og restriktive mulig måten.
9907 Det er en historie om akkurat et slikt eierskapssystem som er velkjent i den
9908 anglo-amerikansk tradisjon. Det kalles "føydalisme". Under føydalismen var
9909 eiendommer ikke bare kontrollert av et relativt lite antall individer og
9910 aktører. Men det føydale systemet hadde en sterk interesse i å sikre at
9911 landeier i systemet ikke svekke føydalismen ved å frigjøre folkene og
9912 eiendomene som de kontrollerte til det frie markedet. Føydalismen var
9913 avhengig av maksimal kontroll og konsentrasjon. Det sloss mot enhver frihet
9914 som kunne forstyrre denne kontrollen.
9915 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2966853"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2966859"></a><p>
9916 Som Peter Drahos og John Braithwaite beskriver, dette er nøyaktig det valget
9917 vi nå gjør om immaterielle rettigheter.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2966871" href=
"#ftn.id2966871" class=
"footnote">204</a>]
</sup>
9918 Vi kommer til å få et informasjonssamfunn. Så mye er sikkert. Vårt eneste
9919 valg nå er hvorvidt dette informasjonssamfunnet skal være
9920 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>fritt
</em></span> eller
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>føydalt
</em></span>. Trenden er
9923 Da denne bataljen brøt ut, blogget jeg om dette. En heftig debatt brøt ut i
9924 kommentarfeltet. Ms. Boland hadde en rekke støttespillere som forsøkte å
9925 vise hvorfor hennes kommentarer ga mening. Men det var spesielt en
9926 kommentar som gjorde meg trist. En anonym kommentator skrev,
9927 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
9929 George, du misforstår Lessig: Han snakker bare om verden slik den burde være
9930 ("målet til WIPO, og målet til enhver regjering, bør være å fremme den
9931 riktige balansen for immaterielle rettigheter, ikke bare å fremme
9932 immaterielle rettigheter"), ikke som den er. Hvis vi snakket om verden slik
9933 den er, så har naturligvis Boland ikke sagt noe galt. Men i verden slik
9934 Lessig vil at den skal være, er det åpenbart at hun har sagt noe galt. En
9935 må alltid være oppmerksom på forskjellen mellom Lessigs og vår verden.
9936 </p></blockquote></div><p>
9937 Jeg gikk glipp av ironien først gangen jeg leste den. Jeg lese den raskt og
9938 trodde forfatteren støttet idéen om at det våre myndigheter burde gjøre var
9939 å søke balanse. (Min kritikk av Ms Boland, selvfølgelig, var ikke om
9940 hvorvidt hun søkte balanse eller ikke; min kritikk var at hennes kommentarer
9941 avslørte en feil kun en førsteårs jussstudent burde kunne gjøre. Jeg har
9942 noen illusjon om ekstremismen hos våre myndigheter, uansett om de er
9943 republikanere eller demokrater. Min eneste tilsynelatende illusjon er
9944 hvorvidt våre myndigheter bør snakke sant eller ikke.)
9946 Det var dermot åpenbart at den som postet meldingen ikke støttet idéen. I
9947 stedet latterliggjorde forfatteren selve idéen om at i den virkelig verden
9948 skulle "målet" til myndighetene være "å fremme den riktige balanse" for
9949 immaterielle rettigheter. Det var åpenbart tåpelig for ham. Og det
9950 avslørte åpenbart, trodde han, min egen tåpelige utopisme. "Typisk for en
9951 akademiker", kunne forfatteren like gjerne ha fortsatt.
9953 Jeg forstår kritikken av akademisk utopisme. Jeg mener også at utopisme er
9954 tåpelig, og jeg vil være blant de første til å gjøre narr av de aburde
9955 urealisistiske idealer til akademikere gjennom historien (og ikke bare i
9956 vårt eget lands historie).
9958 Men når det har blitt dumt å anta at rollen til våre myndigheter bør være å
9959 "oppnå balanse", da kan du regne meg blant de dumme, for det betyr at dette
9960 faktisk har blitt ganske seriøst. Hvis det bør være åpenbart for alle at
9961 myndighetene ikke søker å oppnå balanse, at myndighetene ganske enkelt et
9962 verktøy for de mektigste lobbyistene, at ideen om å forvente bedre av
9963 myndighetene er absurd, at ideen om å kreve at myndighetene snakker sant og
9964 ikke lyver bare er naiv, hva har da vi, det mektigste demokratiet i verden,
9968 Det kan være galskap å forvente at en mektig myndigshetsperson skal si
9969 sannheten. Det kan være galskap å tro at myndighetenes politikk skal gjøre
9970 mer enn å tjene de mektigste interesser. Det kan være galskap å argumentere
9971 for å bevare en tradisjon som har vært en del av vår tradisjon for
9972 mesteparten av vår historie
—fri kultur.
9973 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2966997"></a><p>
9974 Hvis dette er galskap, så la det være mer gærninger. Snart. Det finnes
9975 øyeblikk av håp i denne kampen. Og øyeblikk som overrasker. Da FCC vurderte
9976 mindre strenge eierskapregler, som ville ytterligere konsentrere
9977 mediaeierskap, dannet det seg en en ekstraordinær koalisjon på tvers av
9978 partiene for å bekjempe endringen. For kanskje første gang i historien
9979 organiserte interesser så forskjellige som NRA, ACLU, moveon.org, William
9980 Safire, Ted Turner og Codepink Women for Piece seg for å protestere på denne
9981 endringen i FCC-reglene. Så mange som
700 000 brev ble sendt til FCC med
9982 krav om flere høringer og et annet resultat.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967018"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967024"></a>
9984 Disse protestene stoppet ikke FCC, men like etter stemte en bred koalisjon i
9985 senatet for å reversere avgjørelsen i FCC. De fientlige høringene som ledet
9986 til avstemmingen avslørte hvor mektig denne bevegelsen hadde blitt. Det var
9987 ingen betydnigsfull støtte for FCCs avgjørelse, mens det var bred og
9988 vedvarende støtte for å bekjempe ytterligere konsentrasjon i media.
9990 Men selv denne bevegelsen går glipp av en viktig brikke i puslespillet. Å
9991 være stor er ikke ille i seg selv. Frihet er ikke truet bare på grunn av at
9992 noen blir veldig rik, eller på grunn av at det bare er en håndfull store
9993 aktører. Den dårlige kvaliteten til Big Macs eller Quartar Punders betyr
9994 ikke at du ikke kan få en god hamburger andre steder.
9996 Faren med mediakonsentrasjon kommer ikke fra selve konsentrasjonen, men
9997 kommer fra føydalismen som denne konsentrasjonen fører til når den kobles
9998 til endringer i opphavsretten. Det er ikke kun at det er noen mektige
9999 selskaper som styrer en stadig voksende andel av mediene. Det er at denne
10000 konsentrasjonen kan påkalle en like oppsvulmet rekke
10001 rettigheter
—eiendomsrettigheter i en historisk ekstrem form
—som
10002 gjør størrelsen ille.
10004 Det er derfor betydningsfullt at så mange vil kjempe for å kreve konkurranse
10005 og økt mangfold. Likevel, hvis kampanjen blir forstått til å kun gjelde
10006 størrelse, så er ikke det veldig overraskende. Vi amerikanere har en lang
10007 historie med å slåss mot "stort", klokt eller ikke. At vi kan være motivert
10008 til å slåss mot "store" igjen ikke noe nytt.
10010 Det ville vært noe nytt, og noe veldig viktig, hvis like mange kan være med
10011 på en kampanje for å bekjempe økende ekstremisme bygget inn i idéen om
10012 "intellektuell eiendom". Ikke fordi balanse er fremmed for vår
10013 tradisjon. Jeg agumenterer for at balanse er vår tradisjon. Men fordi evnen
10014 til å tenke kritisk på omfanget av alt som kalles "eiendom" ikke er lenger
10015 er godt trent i denne tradisjonen.
10017 Hvis vi var Akilles, så ville dette være vår hæl. Dette ville være stedet
10019 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967116"></a><p>
10020 Mens jeg skriver disse avsluttende ordene, er nyhetene fylt med historier om
10021 at RIAA saksøker nesten tre hundre individer.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2967129" href=
"#ftn.id2967129" class=
"footnote">205</a>]
</sup> Eminem har nettopp blitt saksøkt for å ha "samplet" noen andres
10022 musikk.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2967175" href=
"#ftn.id2967175" class=
"footnote">206</a>]
</sup> Historien om hvordan Bob Dylan
10023 har "stjålet" fra en japansk forfatter har nettopp gått verden
10024 over.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2967193" href=
"#ftn.id2967193" class=
"footnote">207</a>]
</sup> En på innsiden i
10025 Hollywood
—som insisterer på at han må forbli anonym
—rapporterer
10026 "en utrolig samtale med disse studiofolkene. De har fantastisk [gammelt]
10027 innhold som de ville elske å bruke, men det kan de ikke på grunn av at de
10028 først må klarere rettighetene. De har hauger med ungdommer som kunne gjøre
10029 fantastiske ting med innholdet, men det vil først kreve hauger med advokater
10030 for å klarere det først". Kongressrepresentanter snakker om å gi datavirus
10031 politimyndighet for å ta ned datamaskiner som antas å bryte loven.
10032 Universiteter truer med å utvise ungdommer som bruker en datamaskin for å
10034 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967228"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967234"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967240"></a><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967247"></a><p>
10036 I mens på andre siden av atlanteren har BBC nettopp annonsert at de vil
10037 bygge opp et "kreativt arkiv" som britiske borgere kan laste ned BBC-innhold
10038 fra, og rippe, mikse og brenne det ut.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2967264" href=
"#ftn.id2967264" class=
"footnote">208</a>]
</sup>
10039 Og i Brasil har kulturministeren, Gilberto Gil, i seg selv en folkehelt i
10040 brasiliansk musikk, slått seg sammen med Creative Commons for å gi ut
10041 innhold og frie lisenser i dette latinamerikanske landet.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2967284" href=
"#ftn.id2967284" class=
"footnote">209</a>]
</sup> Jeg har fortalt en mørk historie. Sannheten mer
10042 mer blandet. En teknologi har gitt oss mer frihet. Sakte begynner noen å
10043 forstå at denne friheten trenger ikke å bety anarki. Vi kan få med oss fri
10044 kultur inn i det tjueførste århundre, uten at artister taper og uten at
10045 potensialet for digital teknologi blir knust. Det vil kreve omtanke, og
10046 viktigere, det vil kreve at noen omforme RCAene av i dag til Causbyere.
10049 Sunn fornuft må gjøre opprør. Den må handle for å frigjøre kulturen. Og
10050 snart, hvis dette potensialet skal noen gang bli realisert.
10054 </p><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#id2967321">16.
</a></span></dt></dl></div><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2965906" href=
"#id2965906" class=
"para">195</a>]
</sup>
10056 Commission on Intellectual Property Rights, "Final Report: Integrating
10057 Intellectual Property Rights and Development Policy" (London,
2002),
10058 tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
10059 #
55</a>. I følge en pressemelding fra verdens helseorganisasjon sendt ut
10060 9. juli
2002, mottar kun
320 000 av de
6 millioner som trenger medisiner i
10061 utviklingsland dem de trenger
—og halvparten av dem er i Brasil.
10062 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2965984" href=
"#id2965984" class=
"para">196</a>]
</sup>
10064 See Peter Drahos with John Braithwaite, Information Feudalism:
10065 <em class=
"citetitle">Who Owns the Knowledge Economy?
</em> (New York: The New
10066 Press,
2003),
37.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2965992"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2966001"></a>
10067 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2966020" href=
"#id2966020" class=
"para">197</a>]
</sup>
10070 International Intellectual Property Institute (IIPI),
<em class=
"citetitle">Patent
10071 Protection and Access to HIV/AIDS Pharmaceuticals in Sub-Saharan Africa, a
10072 Report Prepared for the World Intellectual Property Organization
</em>
10073 (Washington, D.C.,
2000),
14, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
56</a>. For a firsthand
10074 account of the struggle over South Africa, see Hearing Before the
10075 Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources, House
10076 Committee on Government Reform, H. Rep.,
1st sess., Ser. No.
106-
126 (
22
10077 July
1999),
150–57 (statement of James Love).
10078 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2966049" href=
"#id2966049" class=
"para">198</a>]
</sup>
10081 International Intellectual Property Institute (IIPI),
<em class=
"citetitle">Patent
10082 Protection and Access to HIV/AIDS Pharmaceuticals in Sub-Saharan Africa, en
10083 rapport forberedt for the World Intellectual Property
10084 Organization
</em> (Washington, D.C.,
2000),
15.
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2966143" href=
"#id2966143" class=
"para">199</a>]
</sup>
10088 See Sabin Russell, "New Crusade to Lower AIDS Drug Costs: Africa's Needs at
10089 Odds with Firms' Profit Motive,"
<em class=
"citetitle">San Francisco
10090 Chronicle
</em>,
24 May
1999, A1, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
57</a> ("compulsory licenses
10091 and gray markets pose a threat to the entire system of intellectual property
10092 protection"); Robert Weissman, "AIDS and Developing Countries: Democratizing
10093 Access to Essential Medicines,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Foreign Policy in
10094 Focus
</em> 4:
23 (August
1999), available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
58</a> (describing
10095 U.S. policy); John A. Harrelson, "TRIPS, Pharmaceutical Patents, and the
10096 HIV/AIDS Crisis: Finding the Proper Balance Between Intellectual Property
10097 Rights and Compassion, a Synopsis,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Widener Law Symposium
10098 Journal
</em> (Spring
2001):
175.
10100 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2966268" href=
"#id2966268" class=
"para">200</a>]
</sup>
10102 Jonathan Krim, "The Quiet War over Open-Source,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Washington
10103 Post
</em>, August
2003, E1, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
59</a>; William New, "Global
10104 Group's Shift on `Open Source' Meeting Spurs Stir,"
<em class=
"citetitle">National
10105 Journal's Technology Daily
</em>,
19 August
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
60</a>; William New,
10106 "U.S. Official Opposes `Open Source' Talks at WIPO,"
<em class=
"citetitle">National
10107 Journal's Technology Daily
</em>,
19 August
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
61</a>.
10108 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2966472" href=
"#id2966472" class=
"para">201</a>]
</sup>
10110 Jeg bør nevne at jeg var en av folkene som ba WIPO om dette møtet.
10111 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2966327" href=
"#id2966327" class=
"para">202</a>]
</sup>
10114 Microsoft's position about free and open source software is more
10115 sophisticated. As it has repeatedly asserted, it has no problem with "open
10116 source" software or software in the public domain. Microsoft's principal
10117 opposition is to "free software" licensed under a "copyleft" license,
10118 meaning a license that requires the licensee to adopt the same terms on any
10119 derivative work. See Bradford L. Smith, "The Future of Software: Enabling
10120 the Marketplace to Decide,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Government Policy Toward Open Source
10121 Software
</em> (Washington, D.C.: AEI-Brookings Joint Center for
10122 Regulatory Studies, American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy
10123 Research,
2002),
69, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
62</a>. See also Craig Mundie,
10124 Microsoft senior vice president,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Commercial Software
10125 Model
</em>, discussion at New York University Stern School of
10126 Business (
3 May
2001), available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
63</a>.
10127 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2966674" href=
"#id2966674" class=
"para">203</a>]
</sup>
10130 Krim, "The Quiet War over Open-Source," tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
64</a>.
10131 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2966871" href=
"#id2966871" class=
"para">204</a>]
</sup>
10133 See Drahos with Braithwaite,
<em class=
"citetitle">Information Feudalism
</em>,
10134 210–20.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2966043"></a>
10135 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2967129" href=
"#id2967129" class=
"para">205</a>]
</sup>
10138 John Borland, "RIAA Sues
261 File Swappers," CNET News.com, September
2003,
10139 available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
65</a>;
10140 Paul R. La Monica, "Music Industry Sues Swappers," CNN/Money,
8 September
10141 2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
10142 #
66</a>; Soni Sangha and Phyllis Furman with Robert Gearty, "Sued for a
10143 Song, N.Y.C.
12-Yr-Old Among
261 Cited as Sharers,"
<em class=
"citetitle">New York
10144 Daily News
</em>,
9 September
2003,
3; Frank Ahrens, "RIAA's Lawsuits
10145 Meet Surprised Targets; Single Mother in Calif.,
12-Year-Old Girl in
10146 N.Y. Among Defendants,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Washington Post
</em>,
10 September
10147 2003, E1; Katie Dean, "Schoolgirl Settles with RIAA,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Wired
10148 News
</em>,
10 September
2003, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
67</a>.
10149 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2967175" href=
"#id2967175" class=
"para">206</a>]
</sup>
10152 Jon Wiederhorn, "Eminem Gets Sued . . . by a Little Old Lady," mtv.com,
10153 17. september
2003, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
68</a>.
10154 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2967193" href=
"#id2967193" class=
"para">207</a>]
</sup>
10158 Kenji Hall, Associated Press, "Japanese Book May Be Inspiration for Dylan
10159 Songs," Kansascity.com,
9. juli
2003, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
69</a>.
10161 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2967264" href=
"#id2967264" class=
"para">208</a>]
</sup>
10163 "BBC Plans to Open Up Its Archive to the Public," pressemelding fra BBC,
10164 24. august
2003, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
70</a>.
10165 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2967284" href=
"#id2967284" class=
"para">209</a>]
</sup>
10168 "Creative Commons and Brazil," Creative Commons Weblog,
6. august
2003,
10169 tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
10171 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 16."><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"id2967321"></a>Kapittel
16.
</h2></div></div></div><p></p></div></div><div class=
"part" title=
"Del VI. Etterord"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h1 class=
"title"><a name=
"c-afterword"></a>Del VI. Etterord
</h1></div></div></div><div class=
"partintro" title=
"Etterord"><div></div><p>
10175 I hvert fall noen av de som har lest helt hit vil være enig med meg om at
10176 noe må gjøres for å endre retningen vi holder. Balansen i denne boken
10177 kartlegger hva som kan gjøres.
10179 I divide this map into two parts: that which anyone can do now, and that
10180 which requires the help of lawmakers. If there is one lesson that we can
10181 draw from the history of remaking common sense, it is that it requires
10182 remaking how many people think about the very same issue.
10184 That means this movement must begin in the streets. It must recruit a
10185 significant number of parents, teachers, librarians, creators, authors,
10186 musicians, filmmakers, scientists
—all to tell this story in their own
10187 words, and to tell their neighbors why this battle is so important.
10189 Once this movement has its effect in the streets, it has some hope of having
10190 an effect in Washington. We are still a democracy. What people think
10191 matters. Not as much as it should, at least when an RCA stands opposed, but
10192 still, it matters. And thus, in the second part below, I sketch changes that
10193 Congress could make to better secure a free culture.
10194 </p><div class=
"section" title=
"Oss, nå"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"usnow"></a>Oss, nå
</h2></div></div></div><p>
10195 Common sense is with the copyright warriors because the debate so far has
10196 been framed at the extremes
—as a grand either/or: either property or
10197 anarchy, either total control or artists won't be paid. If that really is
10198 the choice, then the warriors should win.
10200 The mistake here is the error of the excluded middle. There are extremes in
10201 this debate, but the extremes are not all that there is. There are those who
10202 believe in maximal copyright
—"All Rights Reserved"
— and those
10203 who reject copyright
—"No Rights Reserved." The "All Rights Reserved"
10204 sorts believe that you should ask permission before you "use" a copyrighted
10205 work in any way. The "No Rights Reserved" sorts believe you should be able
10206 to do with content as you wish, regardless of whether you have permission or
10210 When the Internet was first born, its initial architecture effectively
10211 tilted in the "no rights reserved" direction. Content could be copied
10212 perfectly and cheaply; rights could not easily be controlled. Thus,
10213 regardless of anyone's desire, the effective regime of copyright under the
10214 original design of the Internet was "no rights reserved." Content was
10215 "taken" regardless of the rights. Any rights were effectively unprotected.
10217 This initial character produced a reaction (opposite, but not quite equal)
10218 by copyright owners. That reaction has been the topic of this book. Through
10219 legislation, litigation, and changes to the network's design, copyright
10220 holders have been able to change the essential character of the environment
10221 of the original Internet. If the original architecture made the effective
10222 default "no rights reserved," the future architecture will make the
10223 effective default "all rights reserved." The architecture and law that
10224 surround the Internet's design will increasingly produce an environment
10225 where all use of content requires permission. The "cut and paste" world
10226 that defines the Internet today will become a "get permission to cut and
10227 paste" world that is a creator's nightmare.
10229 What's needed is a way to say something in the middle
—neither "all
10230 rights reserved" nor "no rights reserved" but "some rights reserved"
—
10231 and thus a way to respect copyrights but enable creators to free content as
10232 they see fit. In other words, we need a way to restore a set of freedoms
10233 that we could just take for granted before.
10234 </p><div class=
"section" title=
"Gjenoppbygging av friheter som tidligere var antatt: Eksempler"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h3 class=
"title"><a name=
"examples"></a>Gjenoppbygging av friheter som tidligere var antatt: Eksempler
</h3></div></div></div><p>
10235 If you step back from the battle I've been describing here, you will
10236 recognize this problem from other contexts. Think about privacy. Before the
10237 Internet, most of us didn't have to worry much about data about our lives
10238 that we broadcast to the world. If you walked into a bookstore and browsed
10239 through some of the works of Karl Marx, you didn't need to worry about
10240 explaining your browsing habits to your neighbors or boss. The "privacy" of
10241 your browsing habits was assured.
10243 Hva gjorde at det var sikret?
10245 Well, if we think in terms of the modalities I described in chapter
10, your
10246 privacy was assured because of an inefficient architecture for gathering
10247 data and hence a market constraint (cost) on anyone who wanted to gather
10248 that data. If you were a suspected spy for North Korea, working for the CIA,
10249 no doubt your privacy would not be assured. But that's because the CIA
10250 would (we hope) find it valuable enough to spend the thousands required to
10251 track you. But for most of us (again, we can hope), spying doesn't pay. The
10252 highly inefficient architecture of real space means we all enjoy a fairly
10253 robust amount of privacy. That privacy is guaranteed to us by friction. Not
10254 by law (there is no law protecting "privacy" in public places), and in many
10255 places, not by norms (snooping and gossip are just fun), but instead, by the
10256 costs that friction imposes on anyone who would want to spy.
10257 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967498"></a><p>
10258 Enter the Internet, where the cost of tracking browsing in particular has
10259 become quite tiny. If you're a customer at Amazon, then as you browse the
10260 pages, Amazon collects the data about what you've looked at. You know this
10261 because at the side of the page, there's a list of "recently viewed"
10262 pages. Now, because of the architecture of the Net and the function of
10263 cookies on the Net, it is easier to collect the data than not. The friction
10264 has disappeared, and hence any "privacy" protected by the friction
10267 Amazon, of course, is not the problem. But we might begin to worry about
10268 libraries. If you're one of those crazy lefties who thinks that people
10269 should have the "right" to browse in a library without the government
10270 knowing which books you look at (I'm one of those lefties, too), then this
10271 change in the technology of monitoring might concern you. If it becomes
10272 simple to gather and sort who does what in electronic spaces, then the
10273 friction-induced privacy of yesterday disappears.
10276 It is this reality that explains the push of many to define "privacy" on the
10277 Internet. It is the recognition that technology can remove what friction
10278 before gave us that leads many to push for laws to do what friction
10279 did.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2967536" href=
"#ftn.id2967536" class=
"footnote">210</a>]
</sup> And whether you're in favor of
10280 those laws or not, it is the pattern that is important here. We must take
10281 affirmative steps to secure a kind of freedom that was passively provided
10282 before. A change in technology now forces those who believe in privacy to
10283 affirmatively act where, before, privacy was given by default.
10285 A similar story could be told about the birth of the free software
10286 movement. When computers with software were first made available
10287 commercially, the software
—both the source code and the
10288 binaries
— was free. You couldn't run a program written for a Data
10289 General machine on an IBM machine, so Data General and IBM didn't care much
10290 about controlling their software.
10291 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967571"></a><p>
10292 Dette var verden Richard Stallman ble født inn i, og mens han var forsker
10293 ved MIT, lærte han til å elske samfunnet som utviklet seg når en var fri til
10294 å utforske og fikle med programvaren som kjørte på datamaskiner. Av den
10295 smarte sorten selv, og en talentfull programmerer, begynte Stallman å basere
10296 seg frihet til å legge til eller endre på andre personers arbeid.
10298 In an academic setting, at least, that's not a terribly radical idea. In a
10299 math department, anyone would be free to tinker with a proof that someone
10300 offered. If you thought you had a better way to prove a theorem, you could
10301 take what someone else did and change it. In a classics department, if you
10302 believed a colleague's translation of a recently discovered text was flawed,
10303 you were free to improve it. Thus, to Stallman, it seemed obvious that you
10304 should be free to tinker with and improve the code that ran a machine. This,
10305 too, was knowledge. Why shouldn't it be open for criticism like anything
10308 No one answered that question. Instead, the architecture of revenue for
10309 computing changed. As it became possible to import programs from one system
10310 to another, it became economically attractive (at least in the view of some)
10311 to hide the code of your program. So, too, as companies started selling
10312 peripherals for mainframe systems. If I could just take your printer driver
10313 and copy it, then that would make it easier for me to sell a printer to the
10314 market than it was for you.
10317 Thus, the practice of proprietary code began to spread, and by the early
10318 1980s, Stallman found himself surrounded by proprietary code. The world of
10319 free software had been erased by a change in the economics of computing. And
10320 as he believed, if he did nothing about it, then the freedom to change and
10321 share software would be fundamentally weakened.
10323 Therefore, in
1984, Stallman began a project to build a free operating
10324 system, so that at least a strain of free software would survive. That was
10325 the birth of the GNU project, into which Linus Torvalds's "Linux" kernel was
10326 added to produce the GNU/Linux operating system.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967643"></a>
10328 Stallman's technique was to use copyright law to build a world of software
10329 that must be kept free. Software licensed under the Free Software
10330 Foundation's GPL cannot be modified and distributed unless the source code
10331 for that software is made available as well. Thus, anyone building upon
10332 GPL'd software would have to make their buildings free as well. This would
10333 assure, Stallman believed, that an ecology of code would develop that
10334 remained free for others to build upon. His fundamental goal was freedom;
10335 innovative creative code was a byproduct.
10337 Stallman was thus doing for software what privacy advocates now do for
10338 privacy. He was seeking a way to rebuild a kind of freedom that was taken
10339 for granted before. Through the affirmative use of licenses that bind
10340 copyrighted code, Stallman was affirmatively reclaiming a space where free
10341 software would survive. He was actively protecting what before had been
10342 passively guaranteed.
10344 Finally, consider a very recent example that more directly resonates with
10345 the story of this book. This is the shift in the way academic and scientific
10346 journals are produced.
10349 As digital technologies develop, it is becoming obvious to many that
10350 printing thousands of copies of journals every month and sending them to
10351 libraries is perhaps not the most efficient way to distribute
10352 knowledge. Instead, journals are increasingly becoming electronic, and
10353 libraries and their users are given access to these electronic journals
10354 through password-protected sites. Something similar to this has been
10355 happening in law for almost thirty years: Lexis and Westlaw have had
10356 electronic versions of case reports available to subscribers to their
10357 service. Although a Supreme Court opinion is not copyrighted, and anyone is
10358 free to go to a library and read it, Lexis and Westlaw are also free to
10359 charge users for the privilege of gaining access to that Supreme Court
10360 opinion through their respective services.
10362 There's nothing wrong in general with this, and indeed, the ability to
10363 charge for access to even public domain materials is a good incentive for
10364 people to develop new and innovative ways to spread knowledge. The law has
10365 agreed, which is why Lexis and Westlaw have been allowed to flourish. And if
10366 there's nothing wrong with selling the public domain, then there could be
10367 nothing wrong, in principle, with selling access to material that is not in
10370 But what if the only way to get access to social and scientific data was
10371 through proprietary services? What if no one had the ability to browse this
10372 data except by paying for a subscription?
10374 As many are beginning to notice, this is increasingly the reality with
10375 scientific journals. When these journals were distributed in paper form,
10376 libraries could make the journals available to anyone who had access to the
10377 library. Thus, patients with cancer could become cancer experts because the
10378 library gave them access. Or patients trying to understand the risks of a
10379 certain treatment could research those risks by reading all available
10380 articles about that treatment. This freedom was therefore a function of the
10381 institution of libraries (norms) and the technology of paper journals
10382 (architecture)
—namely, that it was very hard to control access to a
10385 As journals become electronic, however, the publishers are demanding that
10386 libraries not give the general public access to the journals. This means
10387 that the freedoms provided by print journals in public libraries begin to
10388 disappear. Thus, as with privacy and with software, a changing technology
10389 and market shrink a freedom taken for granted before.
10391 This shrinking freedom has led many to take affirmative steps to restore the
10392 freedom that has been lost. The Public Library of Science (PLoS), for
10393 example, is a nonprofit corporation dedicated to making scientific research
10394 available to anyone with a Web connection. Authors of scientific work submit
10395 that work to the Public Library of Science. That work is then subject to
10396 peer review. If accepted, the work is then deposited in a public, electronic
10397 archive and made permanently available for free. PLoS also sells a print
10398 version of its work, but the copyright for the print journal does not
10399 inhibit the right of anyone to redistribute the work for free.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967753"></a>
10401 This is one of many such efforts to restore a freedom taken for granted
10402 before, but now threatened by changing technology and markets. There's no
10403 doubt that this alternative competes with the traditional publishers and
10404 their efforts to make money from the exclusive distribution of content. But
10405 competition in our tradition is presumptively a good
—especially when
10406 it helps spread knowledge and science.
10407 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Gjenoppbyggeing av fri kultur: En idé"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h3 class=
"title"><a name=
"oneidea"></a>Gjenoppbyggeing av fri kultur: En idé
</h3></div></div></div><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"idxcc"></a><p>
10408 The same strategy could be applied to culture, as a response to the
10409 increasing control effected through law and technology.
10411 Enter the Creative Commons. The Creative Commons is a nonprofit corporation
10412 established in Massachusetts, but with its home at Stanford University. Its
10413 aim is to build a layer of
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>reasonable
</em></span> copyright on top
10414 of the extremes that now reign. It does this by making it easy for people to
10415 build upon other people's work, by making it simple for creators to express
10416 the freedom for others to take and build upon their work. Simple tags, tied
10417 to human-readable descriptions, tied to bulletproof licenses, make this
10421 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>Simple
</em></span>—which means without a middleman, or
10422 without a lawyer. By developing a free set of licenses that people can
10423 attach to their content, Creative Commons aims to mark a range of content
10424 that can easily, and reliably, be built upon. These tags are then linked to
10425 machine-readable versions of the license that enable computers automatically
10426 to identify content that can easily be shared. These three expressions
10427 together
—a legal license, a human-readable description, and
10428 machine-readable tags
—constitute a Creative Commons license. A
10429 Creative Commons license constitutes a grant of freedom to anyone who
10430 accesses the license, and more importantly, an expression of the ideal that
10431 the person associated with the license believes in something different than
10432 the "All" or "No" extremes. Content is marked with the CC mark, which does
10433 not mean that copyright is waived, but that certain freedoms are given.
10435 These freedoms are beyond the freedoms promised by fair use. Their precise
10436 contours depend upon the choices the creator makes. The creator can choose a
10437 license that permits any use, so long as attribution is given. She can
10438 choose a license that permits only noncommercial use. She can choose a
10439 license that permits any use so long as the same freedoms are given to other
10440 uses ("share and share alike"). Or any use so long as no derivative use is
10441 made. Or any use at all within developing nations. Or any sampling use, so
10442 long as full copies are not made. Or lastly, any educational use.
10444 These choices thus establish a range of freedoms beyond the default of
10445 copyright law. They also enable freedoms that go beyond traditional fair
10446 use. And most importantly, they express these freedoms in a way that
10447 subsequent users can use and rely upon without the need to hire a
10448 lawyer. Creative Commons thus aims to build a layer of content, governed by
10449 a layer of reasonable copyright law, that others can build upon. Voluntary
10450 choice of individuals and creators will make this content available. And
10451 that content will in turn enable us to rebuild a public domain.
10453 This is just one project among many within the Creative Commons. And of
10454 course, Creative Commons is not the only organization pursuing such
10455 freedoms. But the point that distinguishes the Creative Commons from many is
10456 that we are not interested only in talking about a public domain or in
10457 getting legislators to help build a public domain. Our aim is to build a
10458 movement of consumers and producers of content ("content conducers," as
10459 attorney Mia Garlick calls them) who help build the public domain and, by
10460 their work, demonstrate the importance of the public domain to other
10461 creativity.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967878"></a>
10463 The aim is not to fight the "All Rights Reserved" sorts. The aim is to
10464 complement them. The problems that the law creates for us as a culture are
10465 produced by insane and unintended consequences of laws written centuries
10466 ago, applied to a technology that only Jefferson could have imagined. The
10467 rules may well have made sense against a background of technologies from
10468 centuries ago, but they do not make sense against the background of digital
10469 technologies. New rules
—with different freedoms, expressed in ways so
10470 that humans without lawyers can use them
—are needed. Creative Commons
10471 gives people a way effectively to begin to build those rules.
10473 Why would creators participate in giving up total control? Some participate
10474 to better spread their content. Cory Doctorow, for example, is a science
10475 fiction author. His first novel,
<em class=
"citetitle">Down and Out in the Magic
10476 Kingdom
</em>, was released on-line and for free, under a Creative
10477 Commons license, on the same day that it went on sale in bookstores.
10479 Why would a publisher ever agree to this? I suspect his publisher reasoned
10480 like this: There are two groups of people out there: (
1) those who will buy
10481 Cory's book whether or not it's on the Internet, and (
2) those who may never
10482 hear of Cory's book, if it isn't made available for free on the
10483 Internet. Some part of (
1) will download Cory's book instead of buying
10484 it. Call them bad-(
1)s. Some part of (
2) will download Cory's book, like
10485 it, and then decide to buy it. Call them (
2)-goods. If there are more
10486 (
2)-goods than bad-(
1)s, the strategy of releasing Cory's book free on-line
10487 will probably
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>increase
</em></span> sales of Cory's book.
10489 Indeed, the experience of his publisher clearly supports that conclusion.
10490 The book's first printing was exhausted months before the publisher had
10491 expected. This first novel of a science fiction author was a total success.
10494 The idea that free content might increase the value of nonfree content was
10495 confirmed by the experience of another author. Peter Wayner, who wrote a
10496 book about the free software movement titled
<em class=
"citetitle">Free for
10497 All
</em>, made an electronic version of his book free on-line under a
10498 Creative Commons license after the book went out of print. He then monitored
10499 used book store prices for the book. As predicted, as the number of
10500 downloads increased, the used book price for his book increased, as well.
10502 These are examples of using the Commons to better spread proprietary
10503 content. I believe that is a wonderful and common use of the Commons. There
10504 are others who use Creative Commons licenses for other reasons. Many who use
10505 the "sampling license" do so because anything else would be
10506 hypocritical. The sampling license says that others are free, for commercial
10507 or noncommercial purposes, to sample content from the licensed work; they
10508 are just not free to make full copies of the licensed work available to
10509 others. This is consistent with their own art
—they, too, sample from
10510 others. Because the
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>legal
</em></span> costs of sampling are so high
10511 (Walter Leaphart, manager of the rap group Public Enemy, which was born
10512 sampling the music of others, has stated that he does not "allow" Public
10513 Enemy to sample anymore, because the legal costs are so high
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2967963" href=
"#ftn.id2967963" class=
"footnote">211</a>]
</sup>), these artists release into the creative
10514 environment content that others can build upon, so that their form of
10515 creativity might grow.
10517 Finally, there are many who mark their content with a Creative Commons
10518 license just because they want to express to others the importance of
10519 balance in this debate. If you just go along with the system as it is, you
10520 are effectively saying you believe in the "All Rights Reserved" model. Good
10521 for you, but many do not. Many believe that however appropriate that rule is
10522 for Hollywood and freaks, it is not an appropriate description of how most
10523 creators view the rights associated with their content. The Creative Commons
10524 license expresses this notion of "Some Rights Reserved," and gives many the
10525 chance to say it to others.
10528 In the first six months of the Creative Commons experiment, over
1 million
10529 objects were licensed with these free-culture licenses. The next step is
10530 partnerships with middleware content providers to help them build into their
10531 technologies simple ways for users to mark their content with Creative
10532 Commons freedoms. Then the next step is to watch and celebrate creators who
10533 build content based upon content set free.
10535 These are first steps to rebuilding a public domain. They are not mere
10536 arguments; they are action. Building a public domain is the first step to
10537 showing people how important that domain is to creativity and
10538 innovation. Creative Commons relies upon voluntary steps to achieve this
10539 rebuilding. They will lead to a world in which more than voluntary steps are
10542 Creative Commons is just one example of voluntary efforts by individuals and
10543 creators to change the mix of rights that now govern the creative field. The
10544 project does not compete with copyright; it complements it. Its aim is not
10545 to defeat the rights of authors, but to make it easier for authors and
10546 creators to exercise their rights more flexibly and cheaply. That
10547 difference, we believe, will enable creativity to spread more easily.
10548 </p><a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2968042"></a></div></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Dem, snart"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title" style=
"clear: both"><a name=
"themsoon"></a>Dem, snart
</h2></div></div></div><p>
10549 We will not reclaim a free culture by individual action alone. It will also
10550 take important reforms of laws. We have a long way to go before the
10551 politicians will listen to these ideas and implement these reforms. But
10552 that also means that we have time to build awareness around the changes that
10555 In this chapter, I outline five kinds of changes: four that are general, and
10556 one that's specific to the most heated battle of the day, music. Each is a
10557 step, not an end. But any of these steps would carry us a long way to our
10559 </p><div class=
"section" title=
"1. Flere formaliteter"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h3 class=
"title"><a name=
"formalities"></a>1. Flere formaliteter
</h3></div></div></div><p>
10560 If you buy a house, you have to record the sale in a deed. If you buy land
10561 upon which to build a house, you have to record the purchase in a deed. If
10562 you buy a car, you get a bill of sale and register the car. If you buy an
10563 airplane ticket, it has your name on it.
10567 These are all formalities associated with property. They are requirements
10568 that we all must bear if we want our property to be protected.
10570 In contrast, under current copyright law, you automatically get a copyright,
10571 regardless of whether you comply with any formality. You don't have to
10572 register. You don't even have to mark your content. The default is control,
10573 and "formalities" are banished.
10577 As I suggested in chapter
10, the motivation to abolish formalities was a
10578 good one. In the world before digital technologies, formalities imposed a
10579 burden on copyright holders without much benefit. Thus, it was progress when
10580 the law relaxed the formal requirements that a copyright owner must bear to
10581 protect and secure his work. Those formalities were getting in the way.
10583 But the Internet changes all this. Formalities today need not be a
10584 burden. Rather, the world without formalities is the world that burdens
10585 creativity. Today, there is no simple way to know who owns what, or with
10586 whom one must deal in order to use or build upon the creative work of
10587 others. There are no records, there is no system to trace
— there is no
10588 simple way to know how to get permission. Yet given the massive increase in
10589 the scope of copyright's rule, getting permission is a necessary step for
10590 any work that builds upon our past. And thus, the
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>lack
</em></span>
10591 of formalities forces many into silence where they otherwise could speak.
10593 The law should therefore change this requirement
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2968141" href=
"#ftn.id2968141" class=
"footnote">212</a>]
</sup>—but it should not change it by going back to the old, broken
10594 system. We should require formalities, but we should establish a system that
10595 will create the incentives to minimize the burden of these formalities.
10597 The important formalities are three: marking copyrighted work, registering
10598 copyrights, and renewing the claim to copyright. Traditionally, the first of
10599 these three was something the copyright owner did; the second two were
10600 something the government did. But a revised system of formalities would
10601 banish the government from the process, except for the sole purpose of
10602 approving standards developed by others.
10603 </p><div class=
"section" title=
"Registrering og fornying"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h4 class=
"title"><a name=
"registration"></a>Registrering og fornying
</h4></div></div></div><p>
10604 Under the old system, a copyright owner had to file a registration with the
10605 Copyright Office to register or renew a copyright. When filing that
10606 registration, the copyright owner paid a fee. As with most government
10607 agencies, the Copyright Office had little incentive to minimize the burden
10608 of registration; it also had little incentive to minimize the fee. And as
10609 the Copyright Office is not a main target of government policymaking, the
10610 office has historically been terribly underfunded. Thus, when people who
10611 know something about the process hear this idea about formalities, their
10612 first reaction is panic
—nothing could be worse than forcing people to
10613 deal with the mess that is the Copyright Office.
10615 Yet it is always astonishing to me that we, who come from a tradition of
10616 extraordinary innovation in governmental design, can no longer think
10617 innovatively about how governmental functions can be designed. Just because
10618 there is a public purpose to a government role, it doesn't follow that the
10619 government must actually administer the role. Instead, we should be creating
10620 incentives for private parties to serve the public, subject to standards
10621 that the government sets.
10623 In the context of registration, one obvious model is the Internet. There
10624 are at least
32 million Web sites registered around the world. Domain name
10625 owners for these Web sites have to pay a fee to keep their registration
10626 alive. In the main top-level domains (.com, .org, .net), there is a central
10627 registry. The actual registrations are, however, performed by many competing
10628 registrars. That competition drives the cost of registering down, and more
10629 importantly, it drives the ease with which registration occurs up.
10632 We should adopt a similar model for the registration and renewal of
10633 copyrights. The Copyright Office may well serve as the central registry, but
10634 it should not be in the registrar business. Instead, it should establish a
10635 database, and a set of standards for registrars. It should approve
10636 registrars that meet its standards. Those registrars would then compete with
10637 one another to deliver the cheapest and simplest systems for registering and
10638 renewing copyrights. That competition would substantially lower the burden
10639 of this formality
—while producing a database of registrations that
10640 would facilitate the licensing of content.
10641 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"Merking"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h4 class=
"title"><a name=
"marking"></a>Merking
</h4></div></div></div><p>
10642 It used to be that the failure to include a copyright notice on a creative
10643 work meant that the copyright was forfeited. That was a harsh punishment for
10644 failing to comply with a regulatory rule
—akin to imposing the death
10645 penalty for a parking ticket in the world of creative rights. Here again,
10646 there is no reason that a marking requirement needs to be enforced in this
10647 way. And more importantly, there is no reason a marking requirement needs to
10648 be enforced uniformly across all media.
10650 The aim of marking is to signal to the public that this work is copyrighted
10651 and that the author wants to enforce his rights. The mark also makes it easy
10652 to locate a copyright owner to secure permission to use the work.
10654 One of the problems the copyright system confronted early on was that
10655 different copyrighted works had to be differently marked. It wasn't clear
10656 how or where a statue was to be marked, or a record, or a film. A new
10657 marking requirement could solve these problems by recognizing the
10658 differences in media, and by allowing the system of marking to evolve as
10659 technologies enable it to. The system could enable a special signal from the
10660 failure to mark
—not the loss of the copyright, but the loss of the
10661 right to punish someone for failing to get permission first.
10664 Let's start with the last point. If a copyright owner allows his work to be
10665 published without a copyright notice, the consequence of that failure need
10666 not be that the copyright is lost. The consequence could instead be that
10667 anyone has the right to use this work, until the copyright owner complains
10668 and demonstrates that it is his work and he doesn't give
10669 permission.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2968265" href=
"#ftn.id2968265" class=
"footnote">213</a>]
</sup> The meaning of an unmarked
10670 work would therefore be "use unless someone complains." If someone does
10671 complain, then the obligation would be to stop using the work in any new
10672 work from then on though no penalty would attach for existing uses. This
10673 would create a strong incentive for copyright owners to mark their work.
10675 That in turn raises the question about how work should best be marked. Here
10676 again, the system needs to adjust as the technologies evolve. The best way
10677 to ensure that the system evolves is to limit the Copyright Office's role to
10678 that of approving standards for marking content that have been crafted
10681 For example, if a recording industry association devises a method for
10682 marking CDs, it would propose that to the Copyright Office. The Copyright
10683 Office would hold a hearing, at which other proposals could be made. The
10684 Copyright Office would then select the proposal that it judged preferable,
10685 and it would base that choice
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>solely
</em></span> upon the
10686 consideration of which method could best be integrated into the registration
10687 and renewal system. We would not count on the government to innovate; but we
10688 would count on the government to keep the product of innovation in line with
10689 its other important functions.
10691 Finally, marking content clearly would simplify registration requirements.
10692 If photographs were marked by author and year, there would be little reason
10693 not to allow a photographer to reregister, for example, all photographs
10694 taken in a particular year in one quick step. The aim of the formality is
10695 not to burden the creator; the system itself should be kept as simple as
10698 The objective of formalities is to make things clear. The existing system
10699 does nothing to make things clear. Indeed, it seems designed to make things
10702 If formalities such as registration were reinstated, one of the most
10703 difficult aspects of relying upon the public domain would be removed. It
10704 would be simple to identify what content is presumptively free; it would be
10705 simple to identify who controls the rights for a particular kind of content;
10706 it would be simple to assert those rights, and to renew that assertion at
10707 the appropriate time.
10708 </p></div></div><div class=
"section" title=
"2. Kortere vernetid"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h3 class=
"title"><a name=
"shortterms"></a>2. Kortere vernetid
</h3></div></div></div><p>
10709 Vernetiden i opphavsretten har gått fra fjorten år til nittifem år der
10710 selskap har forfatterskapet , og livstiden til forfatteren pluss sytti år
10711 for individuelle forfattere.
10713 In
<em class=
"citetitle">The Future of Ideas
</em>, I proposed a
10714 seventy-five-year term, granted in five-year increments with a requirement
10715 of renewal every five years. That seemed radical enough at the time. But
10716 after we lost
<em class=
"citetitle">Eldred
</em>
10717 v.
<em class=
"citetitle">Ashcroft
</em>, the proposals became even more
10718 radical.
<em class=
"citetitle">The Economist
</em> endorsed a proposal for a
10719 fourteen-year copyright term.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2968396" href=
"#ftn.id2968396" class=
"footnote">214</a>]
</sup> Others
10720 have proposed tying the term to the term for patents.
10722 I agree with those who believe that we need a radical change in copyright's
10723 term. But whether fourteen years or seventy-five, there are four principles
10724 that are important to keep in mind about copyright terms.
10725 </p><div class=
"orderedlist"><ol class=
"orderedlist" type=
"1"><li class=
"listitem"><p>
10728 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>Keep it short:
</em></span> The term should be as long as necessary
10729 to give incentives to create, but no longer. If it were tied to very strong
10730 protections for authors (so authors were able to reclaim rights from
10731 publishers), rights to the same work (not derivative works) might be
10732 extended further. The key is not to tie the work up with legal regulations
10733 when it no longer benefits an author.
10734 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
10738 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>Gjør det enkelt:
</em></span> Skillelinjen mellom verker uten
10739 opphavsrettslig vern og innhold som er beskyttet må forbli klart. Advokater
10740 liker uklarheten som "rimelig bruk" og forskjellen mellom "idéer" og
10741 "uttrykk" har. Denne type lovverk gir dem en masse arbeid. Men de som
10742 skrev grunnloven hadde en enklere idé: vernet versus ikke vernet. Verdien av
10743 korte vernetider er at det er lite behov for å bygge inn unntak i
10744 opphavsretten når vernetiden holdes kort. En klar og aktiv "advokat-fri
10745 sone" gjør komplesiteten av "rimelig bruk" og "idé/uttrykk" mindre nødvendig
10748 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
10750 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>Keep it alive:
</em></span> Copyright should have to be renewed.
10751 Especially if the maximum term is long, the copyright owner should be
10752 required to signal periodically that he wants the protection continued. This
10753 need not be an onerous burden, but there is no reason this monopoly
10754 protection has to be granted for free. On average, it takes ninety minutes
10755 for a veteran to apply for a pension.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2968484" href=
"#ftn.id2968484" class=
"footnote">215</a>]
</sup>
10756 If we make veterans suffer that burden, I don't see why we couldn't require
10757 authors to spend ten minutes every fifty years to file a single form.
10758 <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2968506"></a>
10759 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
10762 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>Keep it prospective:
</em></span> Whatever the term of copyright
10763 should be, the clearest lesson that economists teach is that a term once
10764 given should not be extended. It might have been a mistake in
1923 for the
10765 law to offer authors only a fifty-six-year term. I don't think so, but it's
10766 possible. If it was a mistake, then the consequence was that we got fewer
10767 authors to create in
1923 than we otherwise would have. But we can't correct
10768 that mistake today by increasing the term. No matter what we do today, we
10769 will not increase the number of authors who wrote in
1923. Of course, we can
10770 increase the reward that those who write now get (or alternatively, increase
10771 the copyright burden that smothers many works that are today invisible). But
10772 increasing their reward will not increase their creativity in
1923. What's
10773 not done is not done, and there's nothing we can do about that now.
</p></li></ol></div><p>
10774 Disse endringene vil sammen gi en
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>gjennomsnittlig
</em></span>
10775 opphavsrettslig vernetid som er mye kortere enn den gjeldende vernetiden.
10776 Frem til
1976 var gjennomsnittelig vernetid kun
32.2 år. Vårt mål bør være
10779 Uten tvil vil ekstremistene kalle disse idéene "radikale". (Tross alt, så
10780 kaller jeg dem "ekstremister".) Men igjen, vernetiden jeg anbefalte var
10781 lengre enn vernetiden under Richard Nixon. hvor "radikalt" kan det være å be
10782 om en mer sjenerøs opphavsrettighet enn da Richard Nixon var president?
10783 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"3. Fri Bruk vs. rimelig bruk"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h3 class=
"title"><a name=
"freefairuse"></a>3. Fri Bruk vs. rimelig bruk
</h3></div></div></div><p>
10784 As I observed at the beginning of this book, property law originally granted
10785 property owners the right to control their property from the ground to the
10786 heavens. The airplane came along. The scope of property rights quickly
10787 changed. There was no fuss, no constitutional challenge. It made no sense
10788 anymore to grant that much control, given the emergence of that new
10791 Our Constitution gives Congress the power to give authors "exclusive right"
10792 to "their writings." Congress has given authors an exclusive right to "their
10793 writings" plus any derivative writings (made by others) that are
10794 sufficiently close to the author's original work. Thus, if I write a book,
10795 and you base a movie on that book, I have the power to deny you the right to
10796 release that movie, even though that movie is not "my writing."
10798 Congress granted the beginnings of this right in
1870, when it expanded the
10799 exclusive right of copyright to include a right to control translations and
10800 dramatizations of a work.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2968615" href=
"#ftn.id2968615" class=
"footnote">216</a>]
</sup> The courts
10801 have expanded it slowly through judicial interpretation ever since. This
10802 expansion has been commented upon by one of the law's greatest judges, Judge
10804 </p><div class=
"blockquote"><blockquote class=
"blockquote"><p>
10805 So inured have we become to the extension of the monopoly to a large range
10806 of so-called derivative works, that we no longer sense the oddity of
10807 accepting such an enlargement of copyright while yet intoning the
10808 abracadabra of idea and expression.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2968639" href=
"#ftn.id2968639" class=
"footnote">217</a>]
</sup>
10809 </p></blockquote></div><p>
10810 I think it's time to recognize that there are airplanes in this field and
10811 the expansiveness of these rights of derivative use no longer make
10812 sense. More precisely, they don't make sense for the period of time that a
10813 copyright runs. And they don't make sense as an amorphous grant. Consider
10814 each limitation in turn.
10816 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>Term:
</em></span> If Congress wants to grant a derivative right,
10817 then that right should be for a much shorter term. It makes sense to protect
10818 John Grisham's right to sell the movie rights to his latest novel (or at
10819 least I'm willing to assume it does); but it does not make sense for that
10820 right to run for the same term as the underlying copyright. The derivative
10821 right could be important in inducing creativity; it is not important long
10822 after the creative work is done.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2968669"></a>
10824 <span class=
"emphasis"><em>Scope:
</em></span> Likewise should the scope of derivative rights
10825 be narrowed. Again, there are some cases in which derivative rights are
10826 important. Those should be specified. But the law should draw clear lines
10827 around regulated and unregulated uses of copyrighted material. When all
10828 "reuse" of creative material was within the control of businesses, perhaps
10829 it made sense to require lawyers to negotiate the lines. It no longer makes
10830 sense for lawyers to negotiate the lines. Think about all the creative
10831 possibilities that digital technologies enable; now imagine pouring molasses
10832 into the machines. That's what this general requirement of permission does
10833 to the creative process. Smothers it.
10835 This was the point that Alben made when describing the making of the Clint
10836 Eastwood CD. While it makes sense to require negotiation for foreseeable
10837 derivative rights
—turning a book into a movie, or a poem into a
10838 musical score
—it doesn't make sense to require negotiation for the
10839 unforeseeable. Here, a statutory right would make much more sense.
10841 In each of these cases, the law should mark the uses that are protected, and
10842 the presumption should be that other uses are not protected. This is the
10843 reverse of the recommendation of my colleague Paul Goldstein.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2968724" href=
"#ftn.id2968724" class=
"footnote">218</a>]
</sup> His view is that the law should be written so that
10844 expanded protections follow expanded uses.
10846 Goldstein's analysis would make perfect sense if the cost of the legal
10847 system were small. But as we are currently seeing in the context of the
10848 Internet, the uncertainty about the scope of protection, and the incentives
10849 to protect existing architectures of revenue, combined with a strong
10850 copyright, weaken the process of innovation.
10853 The law could remedy this problem either by removing protection beyond the
10854 part explicitly drawn or by granting reuse rights upon certain statutory
10855 conditions. Either way, the effect would be to free a great deal of culture
10856 to others to cultivate. And under a statutory rights regime, that reuse
10857 would earn artists more income.
10858 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"4. Frigjør musikken—igjen"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h3 class=
"title"><a name=
"liberatemusic"></a>4. Frigjør musikken
—igjen
</h3></div></div></div><p>
10859 The battle that got this whole war going was about music, so it wouldn't be
10860 fair to end this book without addressing the issue that is, to most people,
10861 most pressing
—music. There is no other policy issue that better
10862 teaches the lessons of this book than the battles around the sharing of
10865 The appeal of file-sharing music was the crack cocaine of the Internet's
10866 growth. It drove demand for access to the Internet more powerfully than any
10867 other single application. It was the Internet's killer app
—possibly in
10868 two senses of that word. It no doubt was the application that drove demand
10869 for bandwidth. It may well be the application that drives demand for
10870 regulations that in the end kill innovation on the network.
10872 The aim of copyright, with respect to content in general and music in
10873 particular, is to create the incentives for music to be composed, performed,
10874 and, most importantly, spread. The law does this by giving an exclusive
10875 right to a composer to control public performances of his work, and to a
10876 performing artist to control copies of her performance.
10878 File-sharing networks complicate this model by enabling the spread of
10879 content for which the performer has not been paid. But of course, that's not
10880 all the file-sharing networks do. As I described in chapter
5, they enable
10881 four different kinds of sharing:
10882 </p><div class=
"orderedlist"><ol class=
"orderedlist" type=
"A"><li class=
"listitem"><p>
10885 Det er noen som bruker delingsnettverk som erstatninger for å kjøpe CDer.
10886 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
10889 There are also some who are using sharing networks to sample, on the way to
10891 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
10896 Det er mange som bruker fildelingsnettverk til å få tilgang til innhold som
10897 ikke lenger er i salg, men fortsatt er vernet av opphavsrett eller som ville
10898 ha vært altfor vanskelig å få kjøpt via nettet.
10899 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
10902 Det er mange som bruker fildelingsnettverk for å få tilgang til innhold som
10903 ikke er opphavsrettsbeskyttet, eller for å få tilgang som
10904 opphavsrettsinnehaveren åpenbart går god for.
10905 </p></li></ol></div><p>
10906 Any reform of the law needs to keep these different uses in focus. It must
10907 avoid burdening type D even if it aims to eliminate type A. The eagerness
10908 with which the law aims to eliminate type A, moreover, should depend upon
10909 the magnitude of type B. As with VCRs, if the net effect of sharing is
10910 actually not very harmful, the need for regulation is significantly
10913 As I said in chapter
5, the actual harm caused by sharing is controversial.
10914 For the purposes of this chapter, however, I assume the harm is real. I
10915 assume, in other words, that type A sharing is significantly greater than
10916 type B, and is the dominant use of sharing networks.
10918 Uansett, det er et avgjørende faktum om den gjeldende teknologiske
10919 omgivelsen som vi må huske på hvis vi skal forstå hvordan loven bør reagere.
10921 Today, file sharing is addictive. In ten years, it won't be. It is addictive
10922 today because it is the easiest way to gain access to a broad range of
10923 content. It won't be the easiest way to get access to a broad range of
10924 content in ten years. Today, access to the Internet is cumbersome and
10925 slow
—we in the United States are lucky to have broadband service at
10926 1.5 MBs, and very rarely do we get service at that speed both up and
10927 down. Although wireless access is growing, most of us still get access
10928 across wires. Most only gain access through a machine with a keyboard. The
10929 idea of the always on, always connected Internet is mainly just an idea.
10932 But it will become a reality, and that means the way we get access to the
10933 Internet today is a technology in transition. Policy makers should not make
10934 policy on the basis of technology in transition. They should make policy on
10935 the basis of where the technology is going. The question should not be, how
10936 should the law regulate sharing in this world? The question should be, what
10937 law will we require when the network becomes the network it is clearly
10938 becoming? That network is one in which every machine with electricity is
10939 essentially on the Net; where everywhere you are
—except maybe the
10940 desert or the Rockies
—you can instantaneously be connected to the
10941 Internet. Imagine the Internet as ubiquitous as the best cell-phone service,
10942 where with the flip of a device, you are connected.
10944 In that world, it will be extremely easy to connect to services that give
10945 you access to content on the fly
—such as Internet radio, content that
10946 is streamed to the user when the user demands. Here, then, is the critical
10947 point: When it is
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>extremely
</em></span> easy to connect to services
10948 that give access to content, it will be
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>easier
</em></span> to
10949 connect to services that give you access to content than it will be to
10950 download and store content
<span class=
"emphasis"><em>on the many devices you will have for
10951 playing content
</em></span>. It will be easier, in other words, to subscribe
10952 than it will be to be a database manager, as everyone in the
10953 download-sharing world of Napster-like technologies essentially is. Content
10954 services will compete with content sharing, even if the services charge
10955 money for the content they give access to. Already cell-phone services in
10956 Japan offer music (for a fee) streamed over cell phones (enhanced with plugs
10957 for headphones). The Japanese are paying for this content even though "free"
10958 content is available in the form of MP3s across the Web.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2968955" href=
"#ftn.id2968955" class=
"footnote">219</a>]
</sup>
10962 This point about the future is meant to suggest a perspective on the
10963 present: It is emphatically temporary. The "problem" with file
10964 sharing
—to the extent there is a real problem
—is a problem that
10965 will increasingly disappear as it becomes easier to connect to the
10966 Internet. And thus it is an extraordinary mistake for policy makers today
10967 to be "solving" this problem in light of a technology that will be gone
10968 tomorrow. The question should not be how to regulate the Internet to
10969 eliminate file sharing (the Net will evolve that problem away). The question
10970 instead should be how to assure that artists get paid, during this
10971 transition between twentieth-century models for doing business and
10972 twenty-first-century technologies.
10974 The answer begins with recognizing that there are different "problems" here
10975 to solve. Let's start with type D content
—uncopyrighted content or
10976 copyrighted content that the artist wants shared. The "problem" with this
10977 content is to make sure that the technology that would enable this kind of
10978 sharing is not rendered illegal. You can think of it this way: Pay phones
10979 are used to deliver ransom demands, no doubt. But there are many who need
10980 to use pay phones who have nothing to do with ransoms. It would be wrong to
10981 ban pay phones in order to eliminate kidnapping.
10983 Type C content raises a different "problem." This is content that was, at
10984 one time, published and is no longer available. It may be unavailable
10985 because the artist is no longer valuable enough for the record label he
10986 signed with to carry his work. Or it may be unavailable because the work is
10987 forgotten. Either way, the aim of the law should be to facilitate the access
10988 to this content, ideally in a way that returns something to the artist.
10990 Again, the model here is the used book store. Once a book goes out of print,
10991 it may still be available in libraries and used book stores. But libraries
10992 and used book stores don't pay the copyright owner when someone reads or
10993 buys an out-of-print book. That makes total sense, of course, since any
10994 other system would be so burdensome as to eliminate the possibility of used
10995 book stores' existing. But from the author's perspective, this "sharing" of
10996 his content without his being compensated is less than ideal.
10998 The model of used book stores suggests that the law could simply deem
10999 out-of-print music fair game. If the publisher does not make copies of the
11000 music available for sale, then commercial and noncommercial providers would
11001 be free, under this rule, to "share" that content, even though the sharing
11002 involved making a copy. The copy here would be incidental to the trade; in a
11003 context where commercial publishing has ended, trading music should be as
11004 free as trading books.
11009 Alternatively, the law could create a statutory license that would ensure
11010 that artists get something from the trade of their work. For example, if the
11011 law set a low statutory rate for the commercial sharing of content that was
11012 not offered for sale by a commercial publisher, and if that rate were
11013 automatically transferred to a trust for the benefit of the artist, then
11014 businesses could develop around the idea of trading this content, and
11015 artists would benefit from this trade.
11017 This system would also create an incentive for publishers to keep works
11018 available commercially. Works that are available commercially would not be
11019 subject to this license. Thus, publishers could protect the right to charge
11020 whatever they want for content if they kept the work commercially
11021 available. But if they don't keep it available, and instead, the computer
11022 hard disks of fans around the world keep it alive, then any royalty owed for
11023 such copying should be much less than the amount owed a commercial
11026 The hard case is content of types A and B, and again, this case is hard only
11027 because the extent of the problem will change over time, as the technologies
11028 for gaining access to content change. The law's solution should be as
11029 flexible as the problem is, understanding that we are in the middle of a
11030 radical transformation in the technology for delivering and accessing
11033 Så her er en løsning som i første omgang kan virke veldig undelig for begge
11034 sider i denne krigen, men som jeg tror vil gi mer mening når en får tenkt
11037 Stripped of the rhetoric about the sanctity of property, the basic claim of
11038 the content industry is this: A new technology (the Internet) has harmed a
11039 set of rights that secure copyright. If those rights are to be protected,
11040 then the content industry should be compensated for that harm. Just as the
11041 technology of tobacco harmed the health of millions of Americans, or the
11042 technology of asbestos caused grave illness to thousands of miners, so, too,
11043 has the technology of digital networks harmed the interests of the content
11048 Jeg elsker internett, så jeg liker ikke å sammenligne det med tobakk eller
11049 asbest. Men analogien er rimelig når en ser det fra lovens perspektiv. Og
11050 det foreslår en rimelig respons: I stedet for å forsøke å ødelegge internett
11051 eller p2p-teknologien som i dag skader innholdsleverandører på internett, så
11052 bør vi finne en relativt enkel måte å kompensere de som blir skadelidende.
11054 The idea would be a modification of a proposal that has been floated by
11055 Harvard law professor William Fisher.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2969111" href=
"#ftn.id2969111" class=
"footnote">220</a>]
</sup>
11056 Fisher suggests a very clever way around the current impasse of the
11057 Internet. Under his plan, all content capable of digital transmission would
11058 (
1) be marked with a digital watermark (don't worry about how easy it is to
11059 evade these marks; as you'll see, there's no incentive to evade them). Once
11060 the content is marked, then entrepreneurs would develop (
2) systems to
11061 monitor how many items of each content were distributed. On the basis of
11062 those numbers, then (
3) artists would be compensated. The compensation would
11063 be paid for by (
4) an appropriate tax.
11065 Fisher's proposal is careful and comprehensive. It raises a million
11066 questions, most of which he answers well in his upcoming book,
11067 <em class=
"citetitle">Promises to Keep
</em>. The modification that I would make
11068 is relatively simple: Fisher imagines his proposal replacing the existing
11069 copyright system. I imagine it complementing the existing system. The aim
11070 of the proposal would be to facilitate compensation to the extent that harm
11071 could be shown. This compensation would be temporary, aimed at facilitating
11072 a transition between regimes. And it would require renewal after a period of
11073 years. If it continues to make sense to facilitate free exchange of content,
11074 supported through a taxation system, then it can be continued. If this form
11075 of protection is no longer necessary, then the system could lapse into the
11076 old system of controlling access.
11079 Fisher would balk at the idea of allowing the system to lapse. His aim is
11080 not just to ensure that artists are paid, but also to ensure that the system
11081 supports the widest range of "semiotic democracy" possible. But the aims of
11082 semiotic democracy would be satisfied if the other changes I described were
11083 accomplished
—in particular, the limits on derivative uses. A system
11084 that simply charges for access would not greatly burden semiotic democracy
11085 if there were few limitations on what one was allowed to do with the content
11088 No doubt it would be difficult to calculate the proper measure of "harm" to
11089 an industry. But the difficulty of making that calculation would be
11090 outweighed by the benefit of facilitating innovation. This background system
11091 to compensate would also not need to interfere with innovative proposals
11092 such as Apple's MusicStore. As experts predicted when Apple launched the
11093 MusicStore, it could beat "free" by being easier than free is. This has
11094 proven correct: Apple has sold millions of songs at even the very high price
11095 of
99 cents a song. (At
99 cents, the cost is the equivalent of a per-song
11096 CD price, though the labels have none of the costs of a CD to pay.) Apple's
11097 move was countered by Real Networks, offering music at just
79 cents a
11098 song. And no doubt there will be a great deal of competition to offer and
11099 sell music on-line.
11101 This competition has already occurred against the background of "free" music
11102 from p2p systems. As the sellers of cable television have known for thirty
11103 years, and the sellers of bottled water for much more than that, there is
11104 nothing impossible at all about "competing with free." Indeed, if anything,
11105 the competition spurs the competitors to offer new and better products. This
11106 is precisely what the competitive market was to be about. Thus in Singapore,
11107 though piracy is rampant, movie theaters are often luxurious
—with
11108 "first class" seats, and meals served while you watch a movie
—as they
11109 struggle and succeed in finding ways to compete with "free."
11111 Dette konkurranseregimet, med en sikringsmekanisme å sikre at kunstnere ikke
11112 taper, ville bidra mye til nyskapning innen levering av
11113 innhold. Konkurransen ville fortsette å redusere type-A-deling. Det ville
11114 inspirere en ekstraordinær rekke av nye innovatører
—som ville ha
11115 retten til a bruke innhold, og ikke lenger frykte usikre og barbarisk
11116 strenge straffer fra loven.
11118 Oppsummert, så er dette mitt forslag:
11123 Internett er i endring. Vi bør ikke regulere en teknologi i endring. Vi bør
11124 i stedet regulere for å minimere skaden påført interesser som er berørt av
11125 denne teknologiske endringen, samtidig vi muliggjør, og oppmuntrer, den mest
11126 effektive teknologien vi kan lage.
11128 Vi kan minimere skaden og samtidig maksimere fordelen med innovasjon ved å
11129 </p><div class=
"orderedlist"><ol class=
"orderedlist" type=
"1"><li class=
"listitem"><p>
11132 garantere retten til å engasjere seg i type-D-deling;
11133 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
11136 tillate ikke-kommersiell type-C-deling uten erstatningsansvar, og
11137 kommersiell type-C-deling med en lav og fast rate fastsatt ved lov.
11138 </p></li><li class=
"listitem"><p>
11141 mens denne overgangen pågår, skattlegge og kompensere for type-A-deling, i
11142 den grad faktiske skade kan påvises.
11143 </p></li></ol></div><p>
11144 Men hva om "piratvirksomheten" ikke forsvinner? Hva om det finnes et
11145 konkurranseutsatt marked som tilbyr innhold til en lav kostnad, men et
11146 signifikant antall av forbrukere fortsetter å "ta" innhold uten å betale?
11147 Burde loven gjøre noe da?
11149 Ja, det bør den. Men, nok en gang, hva den bør gjøre avhenger hvordan
11150 realitetene utvikler seg. Disse endringene fjerner kanskje ikke all
11151 type-A-deling. Men det virkelige spørmålet er ikke om de eliminerer deling i
11152 abstrakt betydning. Det virkelige spørsmålet er hvilken effekt det har på
11153 markedet. Er det bedre (a) å ha en teknologi som er
95 prosent sikker og
11154 gir et marked av størrelse
<em class=
"citetitle">x
</em>, eller (b) å ha en
11155 teknologi som er
50 prosent sikker, og som gir et marked som er fem ganger
11156 større enn
<em class=
"citetitle">x
</em>? Mindre sikker kan gi mer uautorisert
11157 deling, men det vil sannsynligvis også gi et mye større marked for
11158 autorisert deling. Det viktigste er å sikre kunstneres kompensasjon uten å
11159 ødelegge internettet. Når det er på plass, kan det hende det er riktig å
11160 finne måter å spore opp de smålige piratene.
11163 Men vi er langt unna å spikke problemet ned til dette delsettet av
11164 type-A-delere. Og vårt fokus inntil er der bør ikke være å finne måter å
11165 ødelegge internettet. Var fokus inntil vi er der bør være hvordan sikre at
11166 artister får betalt, mens vi beskytter rommet for nyskapning og kreativitet
11167 som internettet er.
11168 </p></div><div class=
"section" title=
"5. Spark en masse advokater"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h3 class=
"title"><a name=
"firelawyers"></a>5. Spark en masse advokater
</h3></div></div></div><p>
11169 Jeg er en advokat. Jeg lever av å utdanne advokater. Jeg tror på loven. Jeg
11170 tror på opphavsrettsloven. Jeg har faktisk viet livet til å jobbe med loven,
11171 ikke fordi det er mye penger å tjene, men fordi det innebærer idealer som
11172 jeg elsker å leve opp til.
11174 Likevel har mye av denne boken vært kritikk av advokater, eller rollen
11175 advokater har spilt i denne debatten. Loven taler om idealer, mens det er
11176 min oppfatning av vår yrkesgruppe er blitt for knyttet til klienten. Og i
11177 en verden der rike klienter har sterke synspunkter vil uviljen hos vår
11178 yrkesgruppe til å stille spørsmål med eller protestere mot dette sterke
11179 synet ødelegge loven.
11181 Indisiene for slik bøyning er overbevisene. Jeg er angrepet som en
11182 "radikal" av mange innenfor yrket, og likevel er meningene jeg argumenterer
11183 for nøyaktig de meningene til mange av de mest moderate og betydningsfulle
11184 personene i historien til denne delen av loven. Mange trodde for eksempel at
11185 vår utfordring til lovforslaget om å utvide opphavsrettens vernetid var
11186 galskap. Mens bare tredve år siden mente den dominerende foreleser og
11187 utøver i opphavsrettsfeltet, Melville Nimmer, at den var
11188 åpenbar.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2969485" href=
"#ftn.id2969485" class=
"footnote">221</a>]
</sup>
11191 Min kritikk av rollen som advokater har spilt i denne debatten handler
11192 imidlertid ikke bare om en profesjonell skjevhet. Det handler enda viktigere
11193 om vår manglende evne til å faktisk ta inn over oss hva loven koster.
11195 Økonomer er forventet å være gode til å forstå utgifter og inntekter. Men
11196 som oftest antar økonomene uten peiling på hvordan det juridiske systemet
11197 egentlig fungerer, at transaksjonskostnaden i det juridiske systemet er
11198 lav.
<sup>[
<a name=
"id2969518" href=
"#ftn.id2969518" class=
"footnote">222</a>]
</sup> De ser et system som har
11199 eksistert i hundrevis av år, og de antar at det fungerer slik grunnskolens
11200 samfunnsfagsundervisning lærte dem at det fungerer.
11204 Men det juridiske systemet fungerer ikke. Eller for å være mer nøyaktig, det
11205 fungerer kun for de med mest ressurser. Det er ikke fordi systemet er
11206 korrupt. Jeg tror overhodet ikke vårt juridisk system (på føderalt nivå, i
11207 hvert fall) er korrupt. Jeg mener ganske enkelt at på grunn av at kostnadene
11208 med vårt juridiske systemet er så hårreisende høyt vil en praktisk talt
11209 aldri oppnå rettferdighet.
11211 Disse kostnadene forstyrrer fri kultur på mange vis. En advokats tid
11212 faktureres hos de største firmaene for mer enn $
400 pr. time. Hvor mye tid
11213 bør en slik advokat bruke på å lese sakene nøye, eller undersøke obskure
11214 rettskilder. Svaret er i økende grad: svært lite. Jussen er avhengig av
11215 nøye formulering og utvikling av doktrine, men nøye formulering og utvikling
11216 av doktrine er avhengig av nøyaktig arbeid. Men nøyaktig arbeid koster for
11217 mye, bortsett fra i de mest høyprofilerte og kostbare sakene.
11219 Kostbarheten, klomsetheten og tilfeldigheten til dette systemet håner vår
11220 tradisjon. Og advokater, såvel som akademikere, bør se det som sin plikt å
11221 endre hvordan loven praktiseres
— eller bedre, endre loven slik at den
11222 fungerer. Det er galt at systemet fungerer godt bare for den øverste
11223 1-prosenten av klientene. Det kan gjøres radikalt mer effektivt, og billig,
11224 og dermed radikalt mer rettferdig.
11226 Men inntil en slik reform er gjennomført, bør vi som samfunn holde lover
11227 unna områder der vi vet den bare vil skade. Og det er nettopp det loven
11228 altfor ofte vil gjøre hvis for mye av vår kultur er lovregulert.
11230 Tenk på de fantastiske tingene ditt barn kan gjøre eller lage med digital
11231 teknologi
—filmen, musikken, web-siden, bloggen. Eller tenk på de
11232 fantastiske tingene ditt fellesskap kunne få til med digital
11233 teknologi
—en wiki, oppsetting av låve, kampanje til å endre noe. Tenk
11234 på alle de kreative tingene, og tenk deretter på kald sirup helt inn i
11235 maskinene. Dette er hva et hvert regime som krever tillatelser fører
11236 til. Dette er virkeligheten slik den var i Brezhnevs Russland.
11239 Loven bør regulere i visse områder av kulturen
—men det bør regulere
11240 kultur bare der reguleringen bidrar positivt. Likevel tester advokater
11241 sjeldent sin kraft, eller kraften som de fremmer, mot dette enkle pragmatisk
11242 spørsmålet: "vil det bidra positivt?". Når de blir utfordret om det
11243 utvidede rekkevidden til loven, er advokat-svaret, "Hvorfor ikke?"
11245 Vi burde spørre: "Hvorfor?". Vis meg hvorfor din regulering av kultur er
11246 nødvendig og vis meg hvordan reguleringen bidrar positivt. Før du kan vise
11247 meg begge, holde advokatene din unna.
11248 </p></div></div><div class=
"toc"><p><b>Innholdsfortegnelse
</b></p><dl><dt><span class=
"chapter"><a href=
"#id2969690">17.
</a></span></dt></dl></div><div class=
"footnotes"><br><hr width=
"100" align=
"left"><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2967536" href=
"#id2967536" class=
"para">210</a>]
</sup>
11252 See, for example, Marc Rotenberg, "Fair Information Practices and the
11253 Architecture of Privacy (What Larry Doesn't Get),"
<em class=
"citetitle">Stanford
11254 Technology Law Review
</em> 1 (
2001): par.
6–18, available at
11255 <a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
72</a> (describing
11256 examples in which technology defines privacy policy). See also Jeffrey
11257 Rosen,
<em class=
"citetitle">The Naked Crowd: Reclaiming Security and Freedom in an
11258 Anxious Age
</em> (New York: Random House,
2004) (mapping tradeoffs
11259 between technology and privacy).
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2967963" href=
"#id2967963" class=
"para">211</a>]
</sup>
11263 <em class=
"citetitle">Willful Infringement: A Report from the Front Lines of the Real
11264 Culture Wars
</em> (
2003), produced by Jed Horovitz, directed by Greg
11265 Hittelman, a Fiat Lucre production, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
72</a>.
11266 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2968141" href=
"#id2968141" class=
"para">212</a>]
</sup>
11269 The proposal I am advancing here would apply to American works only.
11270 Obviously, I believe it would be beneficial for the same idea to be adopted
11271 by other countries as well.
</p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2968265" href=
"#id2968265" class=
"para">213</a>]
</sup>
11274 There would be a complication with derivative works that I have not solved
11275 here. In my view, the law of derivatives creates a more complicated system
11276 than is justified by the marginal incentive it creates.
11277 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2968396" href=
"#id2968396" class=
"para">214</a>]
</sup>
11281 "A Radical Rethink,"
<em class=
"citetitle">Economist
</em>,
366:
8308 (
25. januar
11282 2003):
15, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
11284 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2968484" href=
"#id2968484" class=
"para">215</a>]
</sup>
11287 Department of Veterans Affairs, Veteran's Application for Compensation
11288 and/or Pension, VA Form
21-
526 (OMB Approved No.
2900-
0001), tilgjengelig
11289 fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
75</a>.
11290 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2968615" href=
"#id2968615" class=
"para">216</a>]
</sup>
11293 Benjamin Kaplan,
<em class=
"citetitle">An Unhurried View of Copyright
</em> (New
11294 York: Columbia University Press,
1967),
32.
11295 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2968639" href=
"#id2968639" class=
"para">217</a>]
</sup>
11298 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2968724" href=
"#id2968724" class=
"para">218</a>]
</sup>
11300 Paul Goldstein,
<em class=
"citetitle">Copyright's Highway: From Gutenberg to the
11301 Celestial Jukebox
</em> (Stanford: Stanford University Press,
2003),
11302 187–216.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2967547"></a>
11303 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2968955" href=
"#id2968955" class=
"para">219</a>]
</sup>
11306 For eksempel, se, "Music Media Watch," The J@pan Inc. Newsletter,
3 April
11307 2002, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link
11309 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2969111" href=
"#id2969111" class=
"para">220</a>]
</sup>
11311 William Fisher,
<em class=
"citetitle">Digital Music: Problems and
11312 Possibilities
</em> (last revised:
10 October
2000), available at
11313 <a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
77</a>; William Fisher,
11314 <em class=
"citetitle">Promises to Keep: Technology, Law, and the Future of
11315 Entertainment
</em> (forthcoming) (Stanford: Stanford University
11316 Press,
2004), ch.
6, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
78</a>. Professor Netanel has
11317 proposed a related idea that would exempt noncommercial sharing from the
11318 reach of copyright and would establish compensation to artists to balance
11319 any loss. See Neil Weinstock Netanel, "Impose a Noncommercial Use Levy to
11320 Allow Free P2P File Sharing," available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
79</a>. For other proposals,
11321 see Lawrence Lessig, "Who's Holding Back Broadband?"
<em class=
"citetitle">Washington
11322 Post
</em>,
8 January
2002, A17; Philip S. Corwin on behalf of Sharman
11323 Networks, A Letter to Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr., Chairman of the Senate
11324 Foreign Relations Committee,
26 February
2002, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
80</a>; Serguei Osokine,
11325 <em class=
"citetitle">A Quick Case for Intellectual Property Use Fee
11326 (IPUF)
</em>,
3 March
2002, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
81</a>; Jefferson Graham,
11327 "Kazaa, Verizon Propose to Pay Artists Directly,"
<em class=
"citetitle">USA
11328 Today
</em>,
13 May
2002, available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
82</a>; Steven M. Cherry,
11329 "Getting Copyright Right," IEEE Spectrum Online,
1 July
2002, available at
11330 <a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
83</a>; Declan
11331 McCullagh, "Verizon's Copyright Campaign," CNET News.com,
27 August
2002,
11332 available at
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
84</a>.
11333 Fisher's proposal is very similar to Richard Stallman's proposal for
11334 DAT. Unlike Fisher's, Stallman's proposal would not pay artists directly
11335 proportionally, though more popular artists would get more than the less
11336 popular. As is typical with Stallman, his proposal predates the current
11337 debate by about a decade. See
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
85</a>.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2969210"></a> <a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2969218"></a>
11338 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2969485" href=
"#id2969485" class=
"para">221</a>]
</sup>
11341 Lawrence Lessig, "Copyright's First Amendment" (Melville B. Nimmer Memorial
11342 Lecture),
<em class=
"citetitle">UCLA law Review
</em> 48 (
2001):
1057,
11344 </p></div><div class=
"footnote"><p><sup>[
<a name=
"ftn.id2969518" href=
"#id2969518" class=
"para">222</a>]
</sup>
11346 Et godt eksempel er arbeidet til professor Stan Liebowitz. Liebowitz bør få
11347 ros for sin nøye gjennomgang av data om opphavsrettsbrudd, som fikk ham til
11348 å stille spørsmål med sin egen uttalte posisjon
—to ganger. I starten
11349 predicated han at nedlasting ville påføre industrien vesentlig skade. Han
11350 endret så sitt syn etter i lys av dataene, og han har siden endret sitt syn
11351 på nytt. Sammenlign Stan J. Liebowitz,
<em class=
"citetitle">Rethinking the Network
11352 Economy: The True Forces That Drive the Digital Marketplace
</em> (New
11353 York: Amacom,
2002), (gikk igjennom hans originale syn men uttrykte skepsis)
11354 med Stan J. Liebowitz, "Will MP3s Annihilate the Record Industry?"
11355 artikkelutkast, juni
2003, tilgjengelig fra
<a class=
"ulink" href=
"http://free-culture.cc/notes/" target=
"_top">link #
86</a>. Den nøye analysen til
11356 Liebowitz er ekstremt verdifull i sin estimering av effekten av
11357 fildelingsteknologi. Etter mitt syn underestimerer han forøvrig kostnaden
11358 til det juridiske system. Se, for eksempel,
11359 <em class=
"citetitle">Rethinking
</em>,
174–76.
<a class=
"indexterm" name=
"id2969495"></a>
11360 </p></div></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 17."><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"id2969690"></a>Kapittel
17.
</h2></div></div></div><p></p></div></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 18. Notater"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"c-notes"></a>Kapittel
18. Notater
</h2></div></div></div><p>
11361 I denne teksten er det referanser til lenker på verdensveven. Og som alle
11362 som har forsøkt å bruke nettet vet, så vil disse lenkene være svært
11363 ustabile. Jeg har forsøkt å motvirke denne ustabiliteten ved å omdirigere
11364 lesere til den originale kilden gjennom en nettside som hører til denne
11365 boken. For hver lenke under, så kan du gå til http://free-culture.cc/notes
11366 og finne den originale kilden ved å klikke på nummeret etter #-tegnet. Hvis
11367 den originale lenken fortsatt er i live, så vil du bli omdirigert til den
11368 lenken. Hvis den originale lenken har forsvunnet, så vil du bli omdirigert
11369 til en passende referanse til materialet.
11370 </p></div><div class=
"chapter" title=
"Kapittel 19. Takk til"><div class=
"titlepage"><div><div><h2 class=
"title"><a name=
"c-acknowledgments"></a>Kapittel
19. Takk til
</h2></div></div></div><p>
11371 Denne boken er produktet av en lang og så langt mislykket kamp som begynte
11372 da jeg leste om Eric Eldreds krig for å sørge for at bøker forble
11373 frie. Eldreds innsats bidro til å lansere en bevegelse, fri
11374 kultur-bevegelsen, og denne boken er tilegnet ham.
11376 Jeg fikk veiledning på ulike steder fra venner og akademikere, inkludert
11377 Glenn Brown, Peter DiCola, Jennifer Mnookin, Richard Posner, Mark Rose og
11378 Kathleen Sullivan. Og jeg fikk korreksjoner og veiledning fra mange
11379 fantastiske studenter ved Stanford Law School og Stanford University. Det
11380 inkluderer Andrew B. Coan, John Eden, James P. Fellers, Christopher
11381 Guzelian, Erica Goldberg, Robert Hallman, Andrew Harris, Matthew Kahn,
11382 Brian-Link, Ohad Mayblum, Alina Ng og Erica Platt. Jeg er særlig takknemlig
11383 overfor Catherine Crump og Harry Surden, som hjalp til med å styre deres
11384 forskning og til Laura Lynch, som briljant håndterte hæren de samlet, samt
11385 bidro med sitt egen kritisk blikk på mye av dette.
11388 Yuko Noguchi hjalp meg å forstå lovene i Japan, så vel som Japans
11389 kultur. Jeg er henne takknemlig, og til de mange i Japan som hjalp meg med
11390 forundersøkelsene til denne boken: Joi Ito, Takayuki Matsutani, Naoto
11391 Misaki, Michihiro Sasaki, Hiromichi Tanaka, Hiroo Yamagata og Yoshihiro
11392 Yonezawa. Jeg er også takknemlig til professor Nobuhiro Nakayama og Tokyo
11393 University Business Law Center, som ga meg muligheten til å bruke tid i
11394 Japan, og Tadashi Shiraishi og Kiyokazu Yamagami for deres generøse hjelp
11397 Dette er de tradisjonelle former for hjelp som akademikere regelmessig
11398 trekker på. Men i tillegg til dem, har Internett gjort det mulig å motta råd
11399 og korrigering fra mange som jeg har aldri møtt. Blant de som har svart med
11400 svært nyttig råd etter forespørsler om boken på bloggen min er Dr. Muhammed
11401 Al-Ubaydli, David Gerstein og Peter Dimauro, I tillegg en lang liste med de
11402 som hadde spesifikke ideer om måter å utvikle mine argumenter på. De
11403 inkluderte Richard Bondi, Steven Cherry, David Coe, Nik Cubrilovic, Bob
11404 Devine, Charles Eicher, Thomas Guida, Elihu M. Gerson, Jeremy Hunsinger,
11405 Vaughn Iverson, John Karabaic, Jeff Keltner, James Lindenschmidt,
11406 K. L. Mann, Mark Manning, Nora McCauley, Jeffrey McHugh, Evan McMullen, Fred
11407 Norton, John Pormann, Pedro A. D. Rezende, Shabbir Safdar, Saul Schleimer,
11408 Clay Shirky, Adam Shostack, Kragen Sitaker, Chris Smith, Bruce Steinberg,
11409 Andrzej Jan Taramina, Sean Walsh, Matt Wasserman, Miljenko Williams, "Wink,"
11410 Roger Wood, "Ximmbo da Jazz," og Richard Yanco. (jeg beklager hvis jeg gikk
11411 glipp av noen, med datamaskiner kommer feil og en krasj i e-postsystemet
11412 mitt gjorde at jeg mistet en haug med flotte svar.)
11414 Richard Stallman og Michael Carroll har begge lest hele boken i utkast, og
11415 hver av dem har bidratt med svært nyttige korreksjoner og råd. Michael hjalp
11416 meg å se mer tydelig betydningen av regulering for avledede verker . Og
11417 Richard korrigerte en pinlig stor mengde feil. Selv om mitt arbeid er
11418 delvis inspirert av Stallmans, er han ikke enig med meg på vesentlige steder
11421 Til slutt, og for evig, er jeg Bettina takknemlig, som alltid har insistert
11422 på at det ville være endeløs lykke utenfor disse kampene, og som alltid har
11423 hatt rett. Denne trege eleven er som alltid takknemlig for hennes
11424 evigvarende tålmodighet og kjærlighet.
11425 </p></div></div></body></html>
projects / text-free-culture-lessig.git / blob