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2 # Copyright (C) YEAR Free Software Foundation, Inc.
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4 # FIRST AUTHOR <EMAIL@ADDRESS>, YEAR.
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29 #. type: Content of: <book><bookinfo><title>
34 #. type: Content of: <book><bookinfo>
36 msgid "<abbrev>\"freeculture\"</abbrev>"
39 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
40 #: freeculture.xml:24 freeculture.xml:112
42 "HOW BIG MEDIA USES TECHNOLOGY AND THE LAW TO LOCK DOWN CULTURE AND CONTROL "
46 #. type: Content of: <book><bookinfo>
48 msgid "<pubdate>2004-03-25</pubdate>"
51 #. type: Content of: <book><bookinfo><releaseinfo>
53 msgid "Version 2004-02-10"
56 #. type: Content of: <book><bookinfo><authorgroup><author><firstname>
61 #. type: Content of: <book><bookinfo><authorgroup><author><surname>
66 #. type: Content of: <book><bookinfo>
68 msgid "<copyright> <year>2004</year> <holder>Lawrence Lessig</holder> </copyright>"
71 #. type: Content of: <book><bookinfo><legalnotice><para>
74 "This version of <citetitle>Free Culture</citetitle> is licensed under a "
75 "Creative Commons license. This license permits non-commercial use of this "
76 "work, so long as attribution is given. For more information about the "
77 "license, click the icon above, or visit <ulink "
78 "url=\"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/1.0/\">http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/1.0/</ulink>"
81 #. type: Content of: <book><bookinfo><abstract><title>
83 msgid "ABOUT THE AUTHOR"
86 #. type: Content of: <book><bookinfo><abstract><para>
89 "LAWRENCE LESSIG (<ulink "
90 "url=\"http://www.lessig.org/\">http://www.lessig.org</ulink>), professor of "
91 "law and a John A. Wilson Distinguished Faculty Scholar at Stanford Law "
92 "School, is founder of the Stanford Center for Internet and Society and is "
93 "chairman of the Creative Commons (<ulink "
94 "url=\"http://creativecommons.org/\">http://creativecommons.org</ulink>). "
95 "The author of The Future of Ideas (Random House, 2001) and Code: And Other "
96 "Laws of Cyberspace (Basic Books, 1999), Lessig is a member of the boards of "
97 "the Public Library of Science, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and "
98 "Public Knowledge. He was the winner of the Free Software Foundation's Award "
99 "for the Advancement of Free Software, twice listed in BusinessWeek's \"e.biz "
100 "25,\" and named one of Scientific American's \"50 visionaries.\" A graduate "
101 "of the University of Pennsylvania, Cambridge University, and Yale Law "
102 "School, Lessig clerked for Judge Richard Posner of the U.S. Seventh Circuit "
106 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
107 #: freeculture.xml:80
108 msgid "You can buy a copy of this book by clicking on one of the links below:"
111 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><itemizedlist><listitem><para>
112 #: freeculture.xml:83
113 msgid "<ulink url=\"http://www.amazon.com/\">Amazon</ulink>"
116 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><itemizedlist><listitem><para>
117 #: freeculture.xml:84
118 msgid "<ulink url=\"http://www.barnesandnoble.com/\">B&N</ulink>"
121 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><itemizedlist><listitem><para>
122 #: freeculture.xml:85
123 msgid "<ulink url=\"http://www.penguin.com/\">Penguin</ulink>"
126 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
127 #: freeculture.xml:92
128 msgid "ALSO BY LAWRENCE LESSIG"
131 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
132 #: freeculture.xml:95
133 msgid "The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World"
136 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
137 #: freeculture.xml:98
138 msgid "Code: And Other Laws of Cyberspace"
141 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
142 #: freeculture.xml:103
143 msgid "THE PENGUIN PRESS, NEW YORK"
146 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
147 #: freeculture.xml:108
151 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
152 #: freeculture.xml:118
153 msgid "LAWRENCE LESSIG"
156 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
157 #: freeculture.xml:123
159 "THE PENGUIN PRESS, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. 375 Hudson Street "
163 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
164 #: freeculture.xml:127
165 msgid "Copyright © Lawrence Lessig. All rights reserved."
168 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
169 #: freeculture.xml:130
171 "Excerpt from an editorial titled \"The Coming of Copyright Perpetuity,\" "
172 "<citetitle>The New York Times</citetitle>, January 16, 2003. Copyright "
173 "© 2003 by The New York Times Co. Reprinted with permission."
176 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
177 #: freeculture.xml:135
179 "Cartoon in <xref linkend=\"fig-1711\"/> by Paul Conrad, copyright Tribune "
180 "Media Services, Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission."
183 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
184 #: freeculture.xml:139
186 "Diagram in <xref linkend=\"fig-1761\"/> courtesy of the office of FCC "
187 "Commissioner, Michael J. Copps."
190 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
191 #: freeculture.xml:143
192 msgid "Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data"
195 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
196 #: freeculture.xml:146
198 "Lessig, Lawrence. Free culture : how big media uses technology and the law "
199 "to lock down culture and control creativity / Lawrence Lessig."
202 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
203 #: freeculture.xml:151
207 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
208 #: freeculture.xml:154
209 msgid "Includes index."
212 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
213 #: freeculture.xml:157
214 msgid "ISBN 1-59420-006-8 (hardcover)"
217 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
218 #: freeculture.xml:160
220 "1. Intellectual property—United States. 2. Mass media—United "
224 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
225 #: freeculture.xml:163
227 "3. Technological innovations—United States. 4. Art—United "
231 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
232 #: freeculture.xml:166
236 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
237 #: freeculture.xml:169
238 msgid "343.7309'9—dc22"
241 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
242 #: freeculture.xml:172
243 msgid "This book is printed on acid-free paper."
246 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
247 #: freeculture.xml:175
248 msgid "Printed in the United States of America"
251 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
252 #: freeculture.xml:178
253 msgid "1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4"
256 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
257 #: freeculture.xml:181
258 msgid "Designed by Marysarah Quinn"
261 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
262 #: freeculture.xml:185
263 msgid "&translationblock;"
266 #. type: Content of: <book><colophon><para>
267 #: freeculture.xml:189
269 "Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this "
270 "publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval "
271 "system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, "
272 "photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission "
273 "of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book. The "
274 "scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via "
275 "any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and "
276 "punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and "
277 "do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted "
278 "materials. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated."
281 #. type: Content of: <book><dedication><para>
282 #: freeculture.xml:206
284 "To Eric Eldred—whose work first drew me to this cause, and for whom it "
288 #. type: Content of: <book><dedication><para><figure><title>
289 #: freeculture.xml:212
290 msgid "Creative Commons, Some rights reserved"
293 #. type: Content of: <book><dedication><para><figure>
294 #: freeculture.xml:213
295 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/cc.png\"></graphic>"
298 #. type: Content of: <book><dedication><para>
299 #: freeculture.xml:211
300 msgid "<placeholder type=\"figure\" id=\"0\"/>"
303 #. type: Content of: <book><lot><title>
304 #: freeculture.xml:221
305 msgid "List of figures"
308 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><title>
309 #: freeculture.xml:283
313 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><indexterm><primary>
314 #: freeculture.xml:285
318 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para>
319 #: freeculture.xml:288
321 "At the end of his review of my first book, <citetitle>Code: And Other Laws "
322 "of Cyberspace</citetitle>, David Pogue, a brilliant writer and author of "
323 "countless technical and computer-related texts, wrote this:"
326 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
327 #: freeculture.xml:298
329 "David Pogue, \"Don't Just Chat, Do Something,\" <citetitle>New York "
330 "Times</citetitle>, 30 January 2000."
333 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><blockquote><para>
334 #: freeculture.xml:294
336 "Unlike actual law, Internet software has no capacity to punish. It doesn't "
337 "affect people who aren't online (and only a tiny minority of the world "
338 "population is). And if you don't like the Internet's system, you can always "
339 "flip off the modem.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
342 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para>
343 #: freeculture.xml:303
345 "Pogue was skeptical of the core argument of the book—that software, or "
346 "\"code,\" functioned as a kind of law—and his review suggested the "
347 "happy thought that if life in cyberspace got bad, we could always \"drizzle, "
348 "drazzle, druzzle, drome\"-like simply flip a switch and be back home. Turn "
349 "off the modem, unplug the computer, and any troubles that exist in "
350 "<emphasis>that</emphasis> space wouldn't \"affect\" us anymore."
354 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para>
355 #: freeculture.xml:312
357 "Pogue might have been right in 1999—I'm skeptical, but maybe. But "
358 "even if he was right then, the point is not right now: <citetitle>Free "
359 "Culture</citetitle> is about the troubles the Internet causes even after the "
360 "modem is turned off. It is an argument about how the battles that now rage "
361 "regarding life on-line have fundamentally affected \"people who aren't "
362 "online.\" There is no switch that will insulate us from the Internet's "
366 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para>
367 #: freeculture.xml:323
369 "But unlike <citetitle>Code</citetitle>, the argument here is not much about "
370 "the Internet itself. It is instead about the consequence of the Internet to "
371 "a part of our tradition that is much more fundamental, and, as hard as this "
372 "is for a geek-wanna-be to admit, much more important."
375 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para><footnote><para>
376 #: freeculture.xml:335
378 "Richard M. Stallman, <citetitle>Free Software, Free Societies</citetitle> 57 "
379 "(Joshua Gay, ed. 2002)."
382 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para>
383 #: freeculture.xml:330
385 "That tradition is the way our culture gets made. As I explain in the pages "
386 "that follow, we come from a tradition of \"free culture\"—not \"free\" "
387 "as in \"free beer\" (to borrow a phrase from the founder of the free "
388 "software movement<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>), but \"free\" as "
389 "in \"free speech,\" \"free markets,\" \"free trade,\" \"free enterprise,\" "
390 "\"free will,\" and \"free elections.\" A free culture supports and protects "
391 "creators and innovators. It does this directly by granting intellectual "
392 "property rights. But it does so indirectly by limiting the reach of those "
393 "rights, to guarantee that follow-on creators and innovators remain "
394 "<emphasis>as free as possible</emphasis> from the control of the past. A "
395 "free culture is not a culture without property, just as a free market is not "
396 "a market in which everything is free. The opposite of a free culture is a "
397 "\"permission culture\"—a culture in which creators get to create only "
398 "with the permission of the powerful, or of creators from the past."
401 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para>
402 #: freeculture.xml:350
404 "If we understood this change, I believe we would resist it. Not \"we\" on "
405 "the Left or \"you\" on the Right, but we who have no stake in the particular "
406 "industries of culture that defined the twentieth century. Whether you are "
407 "on the Left or the Right, if you are in this sense disinterested, then the "
408 "story I tell here will trouble you. For the changes I describe affect values "
409 "that both sides of our political culture deem fundamental."
412 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><indexterm><primary>
413 #: freeculture.xml:358 freeculture.xml:12702
414 msgid "CodePink Women in Peace"
417 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><indexterm><primary>
418 #: freeculture.xml:369 freeculture.xml:379 freeculture.xml:12715
419 msgid "Safire, William"
422 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para>
423 #: freeculture.xml:360
425 "We saw a glimpse of this bipartisan outrage in the early summer of 2003. As "
426 "the FCC considered changes in media ownership rules that would relax limits "
427 "on media concentration, an extraordinary coalition generated more than "
428 "700,000 letters to the FCC opposing the change. As William Safire described "
429 "marching \"uncomfortably alongside CodePink Women for Peace and the National "
430 "Rifle Association, between liberal Olympia Snowe and conservative Ted "
431 "Stevens,\" he formulated perhaps most simply just what was at stake: the "
432 "concentration of power. And as he asked, <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
436 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
437 #: freeculture.xml:377
439 "William Safire, \"The Great Media Gulp,\" <citetitle>New York "
440 "Times</citetitle>, 22 May 2003. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
443 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><blockquote><para>
444 #: freeculture.xml:373
446 "Does that sound unconservative? Not to me. The concentration of "
447 "power—political, corporate, media, cultural—should be anathema "
448 "to conservatives. The diffusion of power through local control, thereby "
449 "encouraging individual participation, is the essence of federalism and the "
450 "greatest expression of democracy.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
453 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para>
454 #: freeculture.xml:384
456 "This idea is an element of the argument of <citetitle>Free "
457 "Culture</citetitle>, though my focus is not just on the concentration of "
458 "power produced by concentrations in ownership, but more importantly, if "
459 "because less visibly, on the concentration of power produced by a radical "
460 "change in the effective scope of the law. The law is changing; that change "
461 "is altering the way our culture gets made; that change should worry "
462 "you—whether or not you care about the Internet, and whether you're on "
463 "Safire's left or on his right. The inspiration for the title and for much "
464 "of the argument of this book comes from the work of Richard Stallman and the "
465 "Free Software Foundation. Indeed, as I reread Stallman's own work, "
466 "especially the essays in <citetitle>Free Software, Free Society</citetitle>, "
467 "I realize that all of the theoretical insights I develop here are insights "
468 "Stallman described decades ago. One could thus well argue that this work is "
469 "\"merely\" derivative."
473 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para>
474 #: freeculture.xml:400
476 "I accept that criticism, if indeed it is a criticism. The work of a lawyer "
477 "is always derivative, and I mean to do nothing more in this book than to "
478 "remind a culture about a tradition that has always been its own. Like "
479 "Stallman, I defend that tradition on the basis of values. Like Stallman, I "
480 "believe those are the values of freedom. And like Stallman, I believe those "
481 "are values of our past that will need to be defended in our future. A free "
482 "culture has been our past, but it will only be our future if we change the "
483 "path we are on right now. Like Stallman's arguments for free software, an "
484 "argument for free culture stumbles on a confusion that is hard to avoid, and "
485 "even harder to understand. A free culture is not a culture without property; "
486 "it is not a culture in which artists don't get paid. A culture without "
487 "property, or in which creators can't get paid, is anarchy, not "
488 "freedom. Anarchy is not what I advance here."
491 #. type: Content of: <book><preface><para>
492 #: freeculture.xml:418
494 "Instead, the free culture that I defend in this book is a balance between "
495 "anarchy and control. A free culture, like a free market, is filled with "
496 "property. It is filled with rules of property and contract that get enforced "
497 "by the state. But just as a free market is perverted if its property becomes "
498 "feudal, so too can a free culture be queered by extremism in the property "
499 "rights that define it. That is what I fear about our culture today. It is "
500 "against that extremism that this book is written."
503 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><title>
504 #: freeculture.xml:433
508 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
509 #: freeculture.xml:435
511 "On December 17, 1903, on a windy North Carolina beach for just shy of one "
512 "hundred seconds, the Wright brothers demonstrated that a heavier-than-air, "
513 "self-propelled vehicle could fly. The moment was electric and its importance "
514 "widely understood. Almost immediately, there was an explosion of interest in "
515 "this newfound technology of manned flight, and a gaggle of innovators began "
519 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para><footnote><para>
520 #: freeculture.xml:447
522 "St. George Tucker, <citetitle>Blackstone's Commentaries</citetitle> 3 (South "
523 "Hackensack, N.J.: Rothman Reprints, 1969), 18."
526 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
527 #: freeculture.xml:443
529 "At the time the Wright brothers invented the airplane, American law held "
530 "that a property owner presumptively owned not just the surface of his land, "
531 "but all the land below, down to the center of the earth, and all the space "
532 "above, to \"an indefinite extent, upwards.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
533 "id=\"0\"/> For many years, scholars had puzzled about how best to interpret "
534 "the idea that rights in land ran to the heavens. Did that mean that you "
535 "owned the stars? Could you prosecute geese for their willful and regular "
539 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
540 #: freeculture.xml:456
542 "Then came airplanes, and for the first time, this principle of American "
543 "law—deep within the foundations of our tradition, and acknowledged by "
544 "the most important legal thinkers of our past—mattered. If my land "
545 "reaches to the heavens, what happens when United flies over my field? Do I "
546 "have the right to banish it from my property? Am I allowed to enter into an "
547 "exclusive license with Delta Airlines? Could we set up an auction to decide "
548 "how much these rights are worth?"
551 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><indexterm><primary>
552 #: freeculture.xml:464 freeculture.xml:477 freeculture.xml:508 freeculture.xml:527 freeculture.xml:928 freeculture.xml:945 freeculture.xml:991 freeculture.xml:8746 freeculture.xml:12103 freeculture.xml:12806
553 msgid "Causby, Thomas Lee"
556 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><indexterm><primary>
557 #: freeculture.xml:465 freeculture.xml:478 freeculture.xml:509 freeculture.xml:528 freeculture.xml:929 freeculture.xml:946 freeculture.xml:992 freeculture.xml:8747 freeculture.xml:12104 freeculture.xml:12807
558 msgid "Causby, Tinie"
561 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
562 #: freeculture.xml:467
564 "In 1945, these questions became a federal case. When North Carolina farmers "
565 "Thomas Lee and Tinie Causby started losing chickens because of low-flying "
566 "military aircraft (the terrified chickens apparently flew into the barn "
567 "walls and died), the Causbys filed a lawsuit saying that the government was "
568 "trespassing on their land. The airplanes, of course, never touched the "
569 "surface of the Causbys' land. But if, as Blackstone, Kent, and Coke had "
570 "said, their land reached to \"an indefinite extent, upwards,\" then the "
571 "government was trespassing on their property, and the Causbys wanted it to "
575 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
576 #: freeculture.xml:480
578 "The Supreme Court agreed to hear the Causbys' case. Congress had declared "
579 "the airways public, but if one's property really extended to the heavens, "
580 "then Congress's declaration could well have been an unconstitutional "
581 "\"taking\" of property without compensation. The Court acknowledged that "
582 "\"it is ancient doctrine that common law ownership of the land extended to "
583 "the periphery of the universe.\" But Justice Douglas had no patience for "
584 "ancient doctrine. In a single paragraph, hundreds of years of property law "
585 "were erased. As he wrote for the Court,"
588 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
589 #: freeculture.xml:500
591 "United States v. Causby, U.S. 328 (1946): 256, 261. The Court did find that "
592 "there could be a \"taking\" if the government's use of its land effectively "
593 "destroyed the value of the Causbys' land. This example was suggested to me "
594 "by Keith Aoki's wonderful piece, \"(Intellectual) Property and Sovereignty: "
595 "Notes Toward a Cultural Geography of Authorship,\" <citetitle>Stanford Law "
596 "Review</citetitle> 48 (1996): 1293, 1333. See also Paul Goldstein, "
597 "<citetitle>Real Property</citetitle> (Mineola, N.Y.: Foundation Press, "
598 "1984), 1112–13. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> "
599 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
602 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><blockquote><para>
603 #: freeculture.xml:491
605 "[The] doctrine has no place in the modern world. The air is a public "
606 "highway, as Congress has declared. Were that not true, every "
607 "transcontinental flight would subject the operator to countless trespass "
608 "suits. Common sense revolts at the idea. To recognize such private claims to "
609 "the airspace would clog these highways, seriously interfere with their "
610 "control and development in the public interest, and transfer into private "
611 "ownership that to which only the public has a just claim.<placeholder "
612 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
615 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
616 #: freeculture.xml:514
617 msgid "\"Common sense revolts at the idea.\""
621 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
622 #: freeculture.xml:517
624 "This is how the law usually works. Not often this abruptly or impatiently, "
625 "but eventually, this is how it works. It was Douglas's style not to "
626 "dither. Other justices would have blathered on for pages to reach the "
627 "conclusion that Douglas holds in a single line: \"Common sense revolts at "
628 "the idea.\" But whether it takes pages or a few words, it is the special "
629 "genius of a common law system, as ours is, that the law adjusts to the "
630 "technologies of the time. And as it adjusts, it changes. Ideas that were as "
631 "solid as rock in one age crumble in another."
634 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
635 #: freeculture.xml:530
637 "Or at least, this is how things happen when there's no one powerful on the "
638 "other side of the change. The Causbys were just farmers. And though there "
639 "were no doubt many like them who were upset by the growing traffic in the "
640 "air (though one hopes not many chickens flew themselves into walls), the "
641 "Causbys of the world would find it very hard to unite and stop the idea, and "
642 "the technology, that the Wright brothers had birthed. The Wright brothers "
643 "spat airplanes into the technological meme pool; the idea then spread like a "
644 "virus in a chicken coop; farmers like the Causbys found themselves "
645 "surrounded by \"what seemed reasonable\" given the technology that the "
646 "Wrights had produced. They could stand on their farms, dead chickens in "
647 "hand, and shake their fists at these newfangled technologies all they "
648 "wanted. They could call their representatives or even file a lawsuit. But "
649 "in the end, the force of what seems \"obvious\" to everyone else—the "
650 "power of \"common sense\"—would prevail. Their \"private interest\" "
651 "would not be allowed to defeat an obvious public gain."
654 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
655 #: freeculture.xml:559
656 msgid "Bell, Alexander Graham"
659 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
660 #: freeculture.xml:560
661 msgid "Edison, Thomas"
664 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
665 #: freeculture.xml:561
666 msgid "Faraday, Michael"
669 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
670 #: freeculture.xml:548
672 "Edwin Howard Armstrong is one of America's forgotten inventor geniuses. He "
673 "came to the great American inventor scene just after the titans Thomas "
674 "Edison and Alexander Graham Bell. But his work in the area of radio "
675 "technology was perhaps the most important of any single inventor in the "
676 "first fifty years of radio. He was better educated than Michael Faraday, who "
677 "as a bookbinder's apprentice had discovered electric induction in 1831. But "
678 "he had the same intuition about how the world of radio worked, and on at "
679 "least three occasions, Armstrong invented profoundly important technologies "
680 "that advanced our understanding of radio. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
681 "id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/> <placeholder "
682 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"2\"/>"
685 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
686 #: freeculture.xml:564
688 "On the day after Christmas, 1933, four patents were issued to Armstrong for "
689 "his most significant invention—FM radio. Until then, consumer radio "
690 "had been amplitude-modulated (AM) radio. The theorists of the day had said "
691 "that frequency-modulated (FM) radio could never work. They were right about "
692 "FM radio in a narrow band of spectrum. But Armstrong discovered that "
693 "frequency-modulated radio in a wide band of spectrum would deliver an "
694 "astonishing fidelity of sound, with much less transmitter power and static."
697 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
698 #: freeculture.xml:574
700 "On November 5, 1935, he demonstrated the technology at a meeting of the "
701 "Institute of Radio Engineers at the Empire State Building in New York "
702 "City. He tuned his radio dial across a range of AM stations, until the radio "
703 "locked on a broadcast that he had arranged from seventeen miles away. The "
704 "radio fell totally silent, as if dead, and then with a clarity no one else "
705 "in that room had ever heard from an electrical device, it produced the sound "
706 "of an announcer's voice: \"This is amateur station W2AG at Yonkers, New "
707 "York, operating on frequency modulation at two and a half meters.\""
710 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
711 #: freeculture.xml:585
712 msgid "The audience was hearing something no one had thought possible:"
715 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
716 #: freeculture.xml:596
718 "Lawrence Lessing, <citetitle>Man of High Fidelity: Edwin Howard "
719 "Armstrong</citetitle> (Philadelphia: J. B. Lipincott Company, 1956), 209."
722 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><blockquote><para>
723 #: freeculture.xml:589
725 "A glass of water was poured before the microphone in Yonkers; it sounded "
726 "like a glass of water being poured. . . . A paper was crumpled and torn; it "
727 "sounded like paper and not like a crackling forest fire. . . . Sousa marches "
728 "were played from records and a piano solo and guitar number were "
729 "performed. . . . The music was projected with a live-ness rarely if ever "
730 "heard before from a radio \"music box.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
735 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
736 #: freeculture.xml:602
738 "As our own common sense tells us, Armstrong had discovered a vastly superior "
739 "radio technology. But at the time of his invention, Armstrong was working "
740 "for RCA. RCA was the dominant player in the then dominant AM radio "
741 "market. By 1935, there were a thousand radio stations across the United "
742 "States, but the stations in large cities were all owned by a handful of "
746 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
747 #: freeculture.xml:616 freeculture.xml:636
748 msgid "Sarnoff, David"
751 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
752 #: freeculture.xml:611
754 "RCA's president, David Sarnoff, a friend of Armstrong's, was eager that "
755 "Armstrong discover a way to remove static from AM radio. So Sarnoff was "
756 "quite excited when Armstrong told him he had a device that removed static "
757 "from \"radio.\" But when Armstrong demonstrated his invention, Sarnoff was "
758 "not pleased. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
761 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
762 #: freeculture.xml:623
764 "See \"Saints: The Heroes and Geniuses of the Electronic Era,\" First "
765 "Electronic Church of America, at www.webstationone.com/fecha, available at "
766 "<ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #1</ulink>."
769 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><blockquote><para>
770 #: freeculture.xml:620
772 "I thought Armstrong would invent some kind of a filter to remove static from "
773 "our AM radio. I didn't think he'd start a revolution— start up a whole "
774 "damn new industry to compete with RCA.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
778 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
779 #: freeculture.xml:632
781 "Armstrong's invention threatened RCA's AM empire, so the company launched a "
782 "campaign to smother FM radio. While FM may have been a superior technology, "
783 "Sarnoff was a superior tactician. As one author described, <placeholder "
784 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
787 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
788 #: freeculture.xml:645
789 msgid "Lessing, 226."
792 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><blockquote><para>
793 #: freeculture.xml:640
795 "The forces for FM, largely engineering, could not overcome the weight of "
796 "strategy devised by the sales, patent, and legal offices to subdue this "
797 "threat to corporate position. For FM, if allowed to develop unrestrained, "
798 "posed . . . a complete reordering of radio power . . . and the eventual "
799 "overthrow of the carefully restricted AM system on which RCA had grown to "
800 "power.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
803 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
804 #: freeculture.xml:650
806 "RCA at first kept the technology in house, insisting that further tests were "
807 "needed. When, after two years of testing, Armstrong grew impatient, RCA "
808 "began to use its power with the government to stall FM radio's deployment "
809 "generally. In 1936, RCA hired the former head of the FCC and assigned him "
810 "the task of assuring that the FCC assign spectrum in a way that would "
811 "castrate FM—principally by moving FM radio to a different band of "
812 "spectrum. At first, these efforts failed. But when Armstrong and the nation "
813 "were distracted by World War II, RCA's work began to be more "
814 "successful. Soon after the war ended, the FCC announced a set of policies "
815 "that would have one clear effect: FM radio would be crippled. As Lawrence "
816 "Lessing described it,"
819 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
820 #: freeculture.xml:669
821 msgid "Lessing, 256."
824 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><blockquote><para>
825 #: freeculture.xml:665
827 "The series of body blows that FM radio received right after the war, in a "
828 "series of rulings manipulated through the FCC by the big radio interests, "
829 "were almost incredible in their force and deviousness.<placeholder "
830 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
833 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><indexterm><primary>
834 #: freeculture.xml:673
838 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
839 #: freeculture.xml:675
841 "To make room in the spectrum for RCA's latest gamble, television, FM radio "
842 "users were to be moved to a totally new spectrum band. The power of FM radio "
843 "stations was also cut, meaning FM could no longer be used to beam programs "
844 "from one part of the country to another. (This change was strongly "
845 "supported by AT&T, because the loss of FM relaying stations would mean "
846 "radio stations would have to buy wired links from AT&T.) The spread of "
847 "FM radio was thus choked, at least temporarily."
850 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
851 #: freeculture.xml:685
853 "Armstrong resisted RCA's efforts. In response, RCA resisted Armstrong's "
854 "patents. After incorporating FM technology into the emerging standard for "
855 "television, RCA declared the patents invalid—baselessly, and almost "
856 "fifteen years after they were issued. It thus refused to pay him "
857 "royalties. For six years, Armstrong fought an expensive war of litigation to "
858 "defend the patents. Finally, just as the patents expired, RCA offered a "
859 "settlement so low that it would not even cover Armstrong's lawyers' "
860 "fees. Defeated, broken, and now broke, in 1954 Armstrong wrote a short note "
861 "to his wife and then stepped out of a thirteenth-story window to his death."
865 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
866 #: freeculture.xml:697
868 "This is how the law sometimes works. Not often this tragically, and rarely "
869 "with heroic drama, but sometimes, this is how it works. From the beginning, "
870 "government and government agencies have been subject to capture. They are "
871 "more likely captured when a powerful interest is threatened by either a "
872 "legal or technical change. That powerful interest too often exerts its "
873 "influence within the government to get the government to protect it. The "
874 "rhetoric of this protection is of course always public spirited; the reality "
875 "is something different. Ideas that were as solid as rock in one age, but "
876 "that, left to themselves, would crumble in another, are sustained through "
877 "this subtle corruption of our political process. RCA had what the Causbys "
878 "did not: the power to stifle the effect of technological change."
881 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para><footnote><para>
882 #: freeculture.xml:719
884 "Amanda Lenhart, \"The Ever-Shifting Internet Population: A New Look at "
885 "Internet Access and the Digital Divide,\" Pew Internet and American Life "
886 "Project, 15 April 2003: 6, available at <ulink "
887 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #2</ulink>."
890 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
891 #: freeculture.xml:713
893 "There's no single inventor of the Internet. Nor is there any good date upon "
894 "which to mark its birth. Yet in a very short time, the Internet has become "
895 "part of ordinary American life. According to the Pew Internet and American "
896 "Life Project, 58 percent of Americans had access to the Internet in 2002, up "
897 "from 49 percent two years before.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> "
898 "That number could well exceed two thirds of the nation by the end of 2004."
901 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
902 #: freeculture.xml:728
904 "As the Internet has been integrated into ordinary life, it has changed "
905 "things. Some of these changes are technical—the Internet has made "
906 "communication faster, it has lowered the cost of gathering data, and so "
907 "on. These technical changes are not the focus of this book. They are "
908 "important. They are not well understood. But they are the sort of thing that "
909 "would simply go away if we all just switched the Internet off. They don't "
910 "affect people who don't use the Internet, or at least they don't affect them "
911 "directly. They are the proper subject of a book about the Internet. But this "
912 "is not a book about the Internet."
915 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
916 #: freeculture.xml:739
918 "Instead, this book is about an effect of the Internet beyond the Internet "
919 "itself: an effect upon how culture is made. My claim is that the Internet "
920 "has induced an important and unrecognized change in that process. That "
921 "change will radically transform a tradition that is as old as the Republic "
922 "itself. Most, if they recognized this change, would reject it. Yet most "
923 "don't even see the change that the Internet has introduced."
927 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
928 #: freeculture.xml:748
930 "We can glimpse a sense of this change by distinguishing between commercial "
931 "and noncommercial culture, and by mapping the law's regulation of each. By "
932 "\"commercial culture\" I mean that part of our culture that is produced and "
933 "sold or produced to be sold. By \"noncommercial culture\" I mean all the "
934 "rest. When old men sat around parks or on street corners telling stories "
935 "that kids and others consumed, that was noncommercial culture. When Noah "
936 "Webster published his \"Reader,\" or Joel Barlow his poetry, that was "
937 "commercial culture."
940 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
941 #: freeculture.xml:760
943 "At the beginning of our history, and for just about the whole of our "
944 "tradition, noncommercial culture was essentially unregulated. Of course, if "
945 "your stories were lewd, or if your song disturbed the peace, then the law "
946 "might intervene. But the law was never directly concerned with the creation "
947 "or spread of this form of culture, and it left this culture \"free.\" The "
948 "ordinary ways in which ordinary individuals shared and transformed their "
949 "culture—telling stories, reenacting scenes from plays or TV, "
950 "participating in fan clubs, sharing music, making tapes—were left "
954 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
955 #: freeculture.xml:785 freeculture.xml:1800 freeculture.xml:1811
956 msgid "Brandeis, Louis D."
959 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para><footnote><para>
960 #: freeculture.xml:777
962 "This is not the only purpose of copyright, though it is the overwhelmingly "
963 "primary purpose of the copyright established in the federal constitution. "
964 "State copyright law historically protected not just the commercial interest "
965 "in publication, but also a privacy interest. By granting authors the "
966 "exclusive right to first publication, state copyright law gave authors the "
967 "power to control the spread of facts about them. See Samuel D. Warren and "
968 "Louis D. Brandeis, \"The Right to Privacy,\" Harvard Law Review 4 (1890): "
969 "193, 198–200. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
972 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
973 #: freeculture.xml:771
975 "The focus of the law was on commercial creativity. At first slightly, then "
976 "quite extensively, the law protected the incentives of creators by granting "
977 "them exclusive rights to their creative work, so that they could sell those "
978 "exclusive rights in a commercial marketplace.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
979 "id=\"0\"/> This is also, of course, an important part of creativity and "
980 "culture, and it has become an increasingly important part in America. But in "
981 "no sense was it dominant within our tradition. It was instead just one part, "
982 "a controlled part, balanced with the free."
985 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
986 #: freeculture.xml:797 freeculture.xml:9281
987 msgid "Litman, Jessica"
990 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para><footnote><para>
991 #: freeculture.xml:795
993 "See Jessica Litman, <citetitle>Digital Copyright</citetitle> (New York: "
994 "Prometheus Books, 2001), ch. 13. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
997 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
998 #: freeculture.xml:793
1000 "This rough divide between the free and the controlled has now been "
1001 "erased.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The Internet has set the "
1002 "stage for this erasure and, pushed by big media, the law has now affected "
1003 "it. For the first time in our tradition, the ordinary ways in which "
1004 "individuals create and share culture fall within the reach of the regulation "
1005 "of the law, which has expanded to draw within its control a vast amount of "
1006 "culture and creativity that it never reached before. The technology that "
1007 "preserved the balance of our history—between uses of our culture that "
1008 "were free and uses of our culture that were only upon permission—has "
1009 "been undone. The consequence is that we are less and less a free culture, "
1010 "more and more a permission culture."
1013 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1014 #: freeculture.xml:812
1016 "This change gets justified as necessary to protect commercial creativity. "
1017 "And indeed, protectionism is precisely its motivation. But the protectionism "
1018 "that justifies the changes that I will describe below is not the limited and "
1019 "balanced sort that has defined the law in the past. This is not a "
1020 "protectionism to protect artists. It is instead a protectionism to protect "
1021 "certain forms of business. Corporations threatened by the potential of the "
1022 "Internet to change the way both commercial and noncommercial culture are "
1023 "made and shared have united to induce lawmakers to use the law to protect "
1024 "them. It is the story of RCA and Armstrong; it is the dream of the Causbys."
1027 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1028 #: freeculture.xml:825
1030 "For the Internet has unleashed an extraordinary possibility for many to "
1031 "participate in the process of building and cultivating a culture that "
1032 "reaches far beyond local boundaries. That power has changed the marketplace "
1033 "for making and cultivating culture generally, and that change in turn "
1034 "threatens established content industries. The Internet is thus to the "
1035 "industries that built and distributed content in the twentieth century what "
1036 "FM radio was to AM radio, or what the truck was to the railroad industry of "
1037 "the nineteenth century: the beginning of the end, or at least a substantial "
1038 "transformation. Digital technologies, tied to the Internet, could produce a "
1039 "vastly more competitive and vibrant market for building and cultivating "
1040 "culture; that market could include a much wider and more diverse range of "
1041 "creators; those creators could produce and distribute a much more vibrant "
1042 "range of creativity; and depending upon a few important factors, those "
1043 "creators could earn more on average from this system than creators do "
1044 "today—all so long as the RCAs of our day don't use the law to protect "
1045 "themselves against this competition."
1048 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1049 #: freeculture.xml:844
1051 "Yet, as I argue in the pages that follow, that is precisely what is "
1052 "happening in our culture today. These modern-day equivalents of the early "
1053 "twentieth-century radio or nineteenth-century railroads are using their "
1054 "power to get the law to protect them against this new, more efficient, more "
1055 "vibrant technology for building culture. They are succeeding in their plan "
1056 "to remake the Internet before the Internet remakes them."
1059 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para><footnote><para>
1060 #: freeculture.xml:861
1062 "Amy Harmon, \"Black Hawk Download: Moving Beyond Music, Pirates Use New "
1063 "Tools to Turn the Net into an Illicit Video Club,\" <citetitle>New York "
1064 "Times</citetitle>, 17 January 2002."
1067 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1068 #: freeculture.xml:853
1070 "It doesn't seem this way to many. The battles over copyright and the "
1071 "Internet seem remote to most. To the few who follow them, they seem mainly "
1072 "about a much simpler brace of questions—whether \"piracy\" will be "
1073 "permitted, and whether \"property\" will be protected. The \"war\" that has "
1074 "been waged against the technologies of the Internet—what Motion "
1075 "Picture Association of America (MPAA) president Jack Valenti calls his \"own "
1076 "terrorist war\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>—has been "
1077 "framed as a battle about the rule of law and respect for property. To know "
1078 "which side to take in this war, most think that we need only decide whether "
1079 "we're for property or against it."
1082 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1083 #: freeculture.xml:870
1085 "If those really were the choices, then I would be with Jack Valenti and the "
1086 "content industry. I, too, am a believer in property, and especially in the "
1087 "importance of what Mr. Valenti nicely calls \"creative property.\" I believe "
1088 "that \"piracy\" is wrong, and that the law, properly tuned, should punish "
1089 "\"piracy,\" whether on or off the Internet."
1092 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1093 #: freeculture.xml:878
1095 "But those simple beliefs mask a much more fundamental question and a much "
1096 "more dramatic change. My fear is that unless we come to see this change, the "
1097 "war to rid the world of Internet \"pirates\" will also rid our culture of "
1098 "values that have been integral to our tradition from the start."
1101 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
1102 #: freeculture.xml:892 freeculture.xml:14063
1103 msgid "Netanel, Neil Weinstock"
1106 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para><footnote><para>
1107 #: freeculture.xml:890
1109 "Neil W. Netanel, \"Copyright and a Democratic Civil Society,\" "
1110 "<citetitle>Yale Law Journal</citetitle> 106 (1996): 283. <placeholder "
1111 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
1114 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1115 #: freeculture.xml:884
1117 "These values built a tradition that, for at least the first 180 years of our "
1118 "Republic, guaranteed creators the right to build freely upon their past, and "
1119 "protected creators and innovators from either state or private control. The "
1120 "First Amendment protected creators against state control. And as Professor "
1121 "Neil Netanel powerfully argues,<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> "
1122 "copyright law, properly balanced, protected creators against private "
1123 "control. Our tradition was thus neither Soviet nor the tradition of "
1124 "patrons. It instead carved out a wide berth within which creators could "
1125 "cultivate and extend our culture."
1128 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1129 #: freeculture.xml:900
1131 "Yet the law's response to the Internet, when tied to changes in the "
1132 "technology of the Internet itself, has massively increased the effective "
1133 "regulation of creativity in America. To build upon or critique the culture "
1134 "around us one must ask, Oliver Twist–like, for permission first. "
1135 "Permission is, of course, often granted—but it is not often granted to "
1136 "the critical or the independent. We have built a kind of cultural nobility; "
1137 "those within the noble class live easily; those outside it don't. But it is "
1138 "nobility of any form that is alien to our tradition."
1141 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1142 #: freeculture.xml:912
1144 "The story that follows is about this war. Is it not about the \"centrality "
1145 "of technology\" to ordinary life. I don't believe in gods, digital or "
1146 "otherwise. Nor is it an effort to demonize any individual or group, for "
1147 "neither do I believe in a devil, corporate or otherwise. It is not a "
1148 "morality tale. Nor is it a call to jihad against an industry."
1151 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1152 #: freeculture.xml:920
1154 "It is instead an effort to understand a hopelessly destructive war inspired "
1155 "by the technologies of the Internet but reaching far beyond its code. And by "
1156 "understanding this battle, it is an effort to map peace. There is no good "
1157 "reason for the current struggle around Internet technologies to "
1158 "continue. There will be great harm to our tradition and culture if it is "
1159 "allowed to continue unchecked. We must come to understand the source of this "
1160 "war. We must resolve it soon."
1163 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1164 #: freeculture.xml:931
1166 "Like the Causbys' battle, this war is, in part, about \"property.\" The "
1167 "property of this war is not as tangible as the Causbys', and no innocent "
1168 "chicken has yet to lose its life. Yet the ideas surrounding this "
1169 "\"property\" are as obvious to most as the Causbys' claim about the "
1170 "sacredness of their farm was to them. We are the Causbys. Most of us take "
1171 "for granted the extraordinarily powerful claims that the owners of "
1172 "\"intellectual property\" now assert. Most of us, like the Causbys, treat "
1173 "these claims as obvious. And hence we, like the Causbys, object when a new "
1174 "technology interferes with this property. It is as plain to us as it was to "
1175 "them that the new technologies of the Internet are \"trespassing\" upon "
1176 "legitimate claims of \"property.\" It is as plain to us as it was to them "
1177 "that the law should intervene to stop this trespass."
1181 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1182 #: freeculture.xml:948
1184 "And thus, when geeks and technologists defend their Armstrong or Wright "
1185 "brothers technology, most of us are simply unsympathetic. Common sense does "
1186 "not revolt. Unlike in the case of the unlucky Causbys, common sense is on "
1187 "the side of the property owners in this war. Unlike the lucky Wright "
1188 "brothers, the Internet has not inspired a revolution on its side."
1191 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1192 #: freeculture.xml:958
1194 "My hope is to push this common sense along. I have become increasingly "
1195 "amazed by the power of this idea of intellectual property and, more "
1196 "importantly, its power to disable critical thought by policy makers and "
1197 "citizens. There has never been a time in our history when more of our "
1198 "\"culture\" was as \"owned\" as it is now. And yet there has never been a "
1199 "time when the concentration of power to control the "
1200 "<emphasis>uses</emphasis> of culture has been as unquestioningly accepted as "
1204 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1205 #: freeculture.xml:968
1207 "The puzzle is, Why? Is it because we have come to understand a truth about "
1208 "the value and importance of absolute property over ideas and culture? Is it "
1209 "because we have discovered that our tradition of rejecting such an absolute "
1213 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1214 #: freeculture.xml:974
1216 "Or is it because the idea of absolute property over ideas and culture "
1217 "benefits the RCAs of our time and fits our own unreflective intuitions?"
1220 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1221 #: freeculture.xml:978
1223 "Is the radical shift away from our tradition of free culture an instance of "
1224 "America correcting a mistake from its past, as we did after a bloody war "
1225 "with slavery, and as we are slowly doing with inequality? Or is the radical "
1226 "shift away from our tradition of free culture yet another example of a "
1227 "political system captured by a few powerful special interests?"
1230 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1231 #: freeculture.xml:985
1233 "Does common sense lead to the extremes on this question because common sense "
1234 "actually believes in these extremes? Or does common sense stand silent in "
1235 "the face of these extremes because, as with Armstrong versus RCA, the more "
1236 "powerful side has ensured that it has the more powerful view?"
1240 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1241 #: freeculture.xml:994
1243 "I don't mean to be mysterious. My own views are resolved. I believe it was "
1244 "right for common sense to revolt against the extremism of the Causbys. I "
1245 "believe it would be right for common sense to revolt against the extreme "
1246 "claims made today on behalf of \"intellectual property.\" What the law "
1247 "demands today is increasingly as silly as a sheriff arresting an airplane "
1248 "for trespass. But the consequences of this silliness will be much more "
1252 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1253 #: freeculture.xml:1004
1255 "The struggle that rages just now centers on two ideas: \"piracy\" and "
1256 "\"property.\" My aim in this book's next two parts is to explore these two "
1260 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1261 #: freeculture.xml:1009
1263 "My method is not the usual method of an academic. I don't want to plunge you "
1264 "into a complex argument, buttressed with references to obscure French "
1265 "theorists—however natural that is for the weird sort we academics have "
1266 "become. Instead I begin in each part with a collection of stories that set a "
1267 "context within which these apparently simple ideas can be more fully "
1271 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1272 #: freeculture.xml:1017
1274 "The two sections set up the core claim of this book: that while the Internet "
1275 "has indeed produced something fantastic and new, our government, pushed by "
1276 "big media to respond to this \"something new,\" is destroying something very "
1277 "old. Rather than understanding the changes the Internet might permit, and "
1278 "rather than taking time to let \"common sense\" resolve how best to respond, "
1279 "we are allowing those most threatened by the changes to use their power to "
1280 "change the law—and more importantly, to use their power to change "
1281 "something fundamental about who we have always been."
1284 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
1285 #: freeculture.xml:1028
1287 "We allow this, I believe, not because it is right, and not because most of "
1288 "us really believe in these changes. We allow it because the interests most "
1289 "threatened are among the most powerful players in our depressingly "
1290 "compromised process of making law. This book is the story of one more "
1291 "consequence of this form of corruption—a consequence to which most of "
1292 "us remain oblivious."
1295 #. type: Content of: <book><part><title>
1296 #: freeculture.xml:1038
1300 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
1301 #: freeculture.xml:1042 freeculture.xml:4656
1302 msgid "Mansfield, William Murray, Lord"
1305 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1306 #: freeculture.xml:1045
1308 "Since the inception of the law regulating creative property, there has been "
1309 "a war against \"piracy.\" The precise contours of this concept, \"piracy,\" "
1310 "are hard to sketch, but the animating injustice is easy to capture. As Lord "
1311 "Mansfield wrote in a case that extended the reach of English copyright law "
1312 "to include sheet music,"
1316 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
1317 #: freeculture.xml:1057
1319 "<citetitle>Bach</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Longman</citetitle>, 98 "
1320 "Eng. Rep. 1274 (1777) (Mansfield)."
1323 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><blockquote><para>
1324 #: freeculture.xml:1053
1326 "A person may use the copy by playing it, but he has no right to rob the "
1327 "author of the profit, by multiplying copies and disposing of them for his "
1328 "own use.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
1332 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1333 #: freeculture.xml:1063
1335 "Today we are in the middle of another \"war\" against \"piracy.\" The "
1336 "Internet has provoked this war. The Internet makes possible the efficient "
1337 "spread of content. Peer-to-peer (p2p) file sharing is among the most "
1338 "efficient of the efficient technologies the Internet enables. Using "
1339 "distributed intelligence, p2p systems facilitate the easy spread of content "
1340 "in a way unimagined a generation ago."
1343 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1344 #: freeculture.xml:1072
1346 "This efficiency does not respect the traditional lines of copyright. The "
1347 "network doesn't discriminate between the sharing of copyrighted and "
1348 "uncopyrighted content. Thus has there been a vast amount of sharing of "
1349 "copyrighted content. That sharing in turn has excited the war, as copyright "
1350 "owners fear the sharing will \"rob the author of the profit.\""
1353 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1354 #: freeculture.xml:1080
1356 "The warriors have turned to the courts, to the legislatures, and "
1357 "increasingly to technology to defend their \"property\" against this "
1358 "\"piracy.\" A generation of Americans, the warriors warn, is being raised to "
1359 "believe that \"property\" should be \"free.\" Forget tattoos, never mind "
1360 "body piercing—our kids are becoming <emphasis>thieves</emphasis>!"
1363 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1364 #: freeculture.xml:1088
1366 "There's no doubt that \"piracy\" is wrong, and that pirates should be "
1367 "punished. But before we summon the executioners, we should put this notion "
1368 "of \"piracy\" in some context. For as the concept is increasingly used, at "
1369 "its core is an extraordinary idea that is almost certainly wrong."
1372 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1373 #: freeculture.xml:1094
1374 msgid "The idea goes something like this:"
1377 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><blockquote><para>
1378 #: freeculture.xml:1098
1380 "Creative work has value; whenever I use, or take, or build upon the creative "
1381 "work of others, I am taking from them something of value. Whenever I take "
1382 "something of value from someone else, I should have their permission. The "
1383 "taking of something of value from someone else without permission is "
1384 "wrong. It is a form of piracy."
1387 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><indexterm><primary>
1388 #: freeculture.xml:1106
1389 msgid "Dreyfuss, Rochelle"
1393 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
1394 #: freeculture.xml:1112
1396 "See Rochelle Dreyfuss, \"Expressive Genericity: Trademarks as Language in "
1397 "the Pepsi Generation,\" <citetitle>Notre Dame Law Review</citetitle> 65 "
1401 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
1402 #: freeculture.xml:1125 freeculture.xml:6752
1403 msgid "Zittrain, Jonathan"
1406 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
1407 #: freeculture.xml:1120
1409 "Lisa Bannon, \"The Birds May Sing, but Campers Can't Unless They Pay Up,\" "
1410 "<citetitle>Wall Street Journal</citetitle>, 21 August 1996, available at "
1411 "<ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #3</ulink>; Jonathan "
1412 "Zittrain, \"Calling Off the Copyright War: In Battle of Property vs. Free "
1413 "Speech, No One Wins,\" <citetitle>Boston Globe</citetitle>, 24 November "
1414 "2002. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
1417 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1418 #: freeculture.xml:1108
1420 "This view runs deep within the current debates. It is what NYU law professor "
1421 "Rochelle Dreyfuss criticizes as the \"if value, then right\" theory of "
1422 "creative property<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> —if there "
1423 "is value, then someone must have a right to that value. It is the "
1424 "perspective that led a composers' rights organization, ASCAP, to sue the "
1425 "Girl Scouts for failing to pay for the songs that girls sang around Girl "
1426 "Scout campfires.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> There was "
1427 "\"value\" (the songs) so there must have been a \"right\"—even against "
1431 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><indexterm><primary>
1432 #: freeculture.xml:1130
1437 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1438 #: freeculture.xml:1132
1440 "This idea is certainly a possible understanding of how creative property "
1441 "should work. It might well be a possible design for a system of law "
1442 "protecting creative property. But the \"if value, then right\" theory of "
1443 "creative property has never been America's theory of creative property. It "
1444 "has never taken hold within our law."
1447 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1448 #: freeculture.xml:1140
1450 "Instead, in our tradition, intellectual property is an instrument. It sets "
1451 "the groundwork for a richly creative society but remains subservient to the "
1452 "value of creativity. The current debate has this turned around. We have "
1453 "become so concerned with protecting the instrument that we are losing sight "
1457 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1458 #: freeculture.xml:1147
1460 "The source of this confusion is a distinction that the law no longer takes "
1461 "care to draw—the distinction between republishing someone's work on "
1462 "the one hand and building upon or transforming that work on the "
1463 "other. Copyright law at its birth had only publishing as its concern; "
1464 "copyright law today regulates both."
1467 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1468 #: freeculture.xml:1154
1470 "Before the technologies of the Internet, this conflation didn't matter all "
1471 "that much. The technologies of publishing were expensive; that meant the "
1472 "vast majority of publishing was commercial. Commercial entities could bear "
1473 "the burden of the law—even the burden of the Byzantine complexity that "
1474 "copyright law has become. It was just one more expense of doing business."
1477 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
1478 #: freeculture.xml:1161 freeculture.xml:1189
1479 msgid "Florida, Richard"
1482 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
1483 #: freeculture.xml:1182
1485 "In <citetitle>The Rise of the Creative Class</citetitle> (New York: Basic "
1486 "Books, 2002), Richard Florida documents a shift in the nature of labor "
1487 "toward a labor of creativity. His work, however, doesn't directly address "
1488 "the legal conditions under which that creativity is enabled or stifled. I "
1489 "certainly agree with him about the importance and significance of this "
1490 "change, but I also believe the conditions under which it will be enabled are "
1491 "much more tenuous. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
1494 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1495 #: freeculture.xml:1163
1497 "But with the birth of the Internet, this natural limit to the reach of the "
1498 "law has disappeared. The law controls not just the creativity of commercial "
1499 "creators but effectively that of anyone. Although that expansion would not "
1500 "matter much if copyright law regulated only \"copying,\" when the law "
1501 "regulates as broadly and obscurely as it does, the extension matters a "
1502 "lot. The burden of this law now vastly outweighs any original "
1503 "benefit—certainly as it affects noncommercial creativity, and "
1504 "increasingly as it affects commercial creativity as well. Thus, as we'll see "
1505 "more clearly in the chapters below, the law's role is less and less to "
1506 "support creativity, and more and more to protect certain industries against "
1507 "competition. Just at the time digital technology could unleash an "
1508 "extraordinary range of commercial and noncommercial creativity, the law "
1509 "burdens this creativity with insanely complex and vague rules and with the "
1510 "threat of obscenely severe penalties. We may be seeing, as Richard Florida "
1511 "writes, the \"Rise of the Creative Class.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
1512 "id=\"0\"/> Unfortunately, we are also seeing an extraordinary rise of "
1513 "regulation of this creative class."
1516 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
1517 #: freeculture.xml:1195
1519 "These burdens make no sense in our tradition. We should begin by "
1520 "understanding that tradition a bit more and by placing in their proper "
1521 "context the current battles about behavior labeled \"piracy.\""
1524 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
1525 #: freeculture.xml:1203
1526 msgid "CHAPTER ONE: Creators"
1529 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1530 #: freeculture.xml:1205
1532 "In 1928, a cartoon character was born. An early Mickey Mouse made his debut "
1533 "in May of that year, in a silent flop called <citetitle>Plane "
1534 "Crazy</citetitle>. In November, in New York City's Colony Theater, in the "
1535 "first widely distributed cartoon synchronized with sound, "
1536 "<citetitle>Steamboat Willie</citetitle> brought to life the character that "
1537 "would become Mickey Mouse."
1540 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1541 #: freeculture.xml:1212
1543 "Synchronized sound had been introduced to film a year earlier in the movie "
1544 "<citetitle>The Jazz Singer</citetitle>. That success led Walt Disney to copy "
1545 "the technique and mix sound with cartoons. No one knew whether it would work "
1546 "or, if it did work, whether it would win an audience. But when Disney ran a "
1547 "test in the summer of 1928, the results were unambiguous. As Disney "
1548 "describes that first experiment,"
1552 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
1553 #: freeculture.xml:1221
1555 "A couple of my boys could read music, and one of them could play a mouth "
1556 "organ. We put them in a room where they could not see the screen and "
1557 "arranged to pipe their sound into the room where our wives and friends were "
1558 "going to see the picture."
1561 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
1562 #: freeculture.xml:1228
1564 "The boys worked from a music and sound-effects score. After several false "
1565 "starts, sound and action got off with the gun. The mouth organist played the "
1566 "tune, the rest of us in the sound department bammed tin pans and blew slide "
1567 "whistles on the beat. The synchronization was pretty close."
1571 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
1572 #: freeculture.xml:1241
1574 "Leonard Maltin, <citetitle>Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated "
1575 "Cartoons</citetitle> (New York: Penguin Books, 1987), 34–35."
1578 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
1579 #: freeculture.xml:1235
1581 "The effect on our little audience was nothing less than electric. They "
1582 "responded almost instinctively to this union of sound and motion. I thought "
1583 "they were kidding me. So they put me in the audience and ran the action "
1584 "again. It was terrible, but it was wonderful! And it was something "
1585 "new!<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
1588 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
1589 #: freeculture.xml:1250
1593 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1594 #: freeculture.xml:1247
1596 "Disney's then partner, and one of animation's most extraordinary talents, Ub "
1597 "Iwerks, put it more strongly: \"I have never been so thrilled in my "
1598 "life. Nothing since has ever equaled it.\" <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
1602 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1603 #: freeculture.xml:1253
1605 "Disney had created something very new, based upon something relatively "
1606 "new. Synchronized sound brought life to a form of creativity that had "
1607 "rarely—except in Disney's hands—been anything more than filler "
1608 "for other films. Throughout animation's early history, it was Disney's "
1609 "invention that set the standard that others struggled to match. And quite "
1610 "often, Disney's great genius, his spark of creativity, was built upon the "
1614 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1615 #: freeculture.xml:1262
1617 "This much is familiar. What you might not know is that 1928 also marks "
1618 "another important transition. In that year, a comic (as opposed to cartoon) "
1619 "genius created his last independently produced silent film. That genius was "
1620 "Buster Keaton. The film was <citetitle>Steamboat Bill, Jr</citetitle>."
1623 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1624 #: freeculture.xml:1268
1626 "Keaton was born into a vaudeville family in 1895. In the era of silent film, "
1627 "he had mastered using broad physical comedy as a way to spark uncontrollable "
1628 "laughter from his audience. <citetitle>Steamboat Bill, Jr</citetitle>. was a "
1629 "classic of this form, famous among film buffs for its incredible stunts. "
1630 "The film was classic Keaton—wildly popular and among the best of its "
1635 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
1636 #: freeculture.xml:1282
1638 "I am grateful to David Gerstein and his careful history, described at <ulink "
1639 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #4</ulink>. According to Dave "
1640 "Smith of the Disney Archives, Disney paid royalties to use the music for "
1641 "five songs in <citetitle>Steamboat Willie</citetitle>: \"Steamboat Bill,\" "
1642 "\"The Simpleton\" (Delille), \"Mischief Makers\" (Carbonara), \"Joyful Hurry "
1643 "No. 1\" (Baron), and \"Gawky Rube\" (Lakay). A sixth song, \"The Turkey in "
1644 "the Straw,\" was already in the public domain. Letter from David Smith to "
1645 "Harry Surden, 10 July 2003, on file with author."
1648 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1649 #: freeculture.xml:1276
1651 "<citetitle>Steamboat Bill, Jr</citetitle>. appeared before Disney's cartoon "
1652 "Steamboat Willie. The coincidence of titles is not coincidental. Steamboat "
1653 "Willie is a direct cartoon parody of Steamboat Bill,<placeholder "
1654 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> and both are built upon a common song as a "
1655 "source. It is not just from the invention of synchronized sound in "
1656 "<citetitle>The Jazz Singer</citetitle> that we get <citetitle>Steamboat "
1657 "Willie</citetitle>. It is also from Buster Keaton's invention of Steamboat "
1658 "Bill, Jr., itself inspired by the song \"Steamboat Bill,\" that we get "
1659 "Steamboat Willie, and then from Steamboat Willie, Mickey Mouse."
1663 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
1664 #: freeculture.xml:1303
1666 "He was also a fan of the public domain. See Chris Sprigman, \"The Mouse that "
1667 "Ate the Public Domain,\" Findlaw, 5 March 2002, at <ulink "
1668 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #5</ulink>."
1671 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1672 #: freeculture.xml:1299
1674 "This \"borrowing\" was nothing unique, either for Disney or for the "
1675 "industry. Disney was always parroting the feature-length mainstream films of "
1676 "his day.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> So did many others. Early "
1677 "cartoons are filled with knockoffs—slight variations on winning "
1678 "themes; retellings of ancient stories. The key to success was the brilliance "
1679 "of the differences. With Disney, it was sound that gave his animation its "
1680 "spark. Later, it was the quality of his work relative to the production-line "
1681 "cartoons with which he competed. Yet these additions were built upon a base "
1682 "that was borrowed. Disney added to the work of others before him, creating "
1683 "something new out of something just barely old."
1686 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1687 #: freeculture.xml:1318
1689 "Sometimes this borrowing was slight. Sometimes it was significant. Think "
1690 "about the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm. If you're as oblivious as I "
1691 "was, you're likely to think that these tales are happy, sweet stories, "
1692 "appropriate for any child at bedtime. In fact, the Grimm fairy tales are, "
1693 "well, for us, grim. It is a rare and perhaps overly ambitious parent who "
1694 "would dare to read these bloody, moralistic stories to his or her child, at "
1695 "bedtime or anytime."
1699 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1700 #: freeculture.xml:1327
1702 "Disney took these stories and retold them in a way that carried them into a "
1703 "new age. He animated the stories, with both characters and light. Without "
1704 "removing the elements of fear and danger altogether, he made funny what was "
1705 "dark and injected a genuine emotion of compassion where before there was "
1706 "fear. And not just with the work of the Brothers Grimm. Indeed, the catalog "
1707 "of Disney work drawing upon the work of others is astonishing when set "
1708 "together: <citetitle>Snow White</citetitle> (1937), "
1709 "<citetitle>Fantasia</citetitle> (1940), <citetitle>Pinocchio</citetitle> "
1710 "(1940), <citetitle>Dumbo</citetitle> (1941), <citetitle>Bambi</citetitle> "
1711 "(1942), <citetitle>Song of the South</citetitle> (1946), "
1712 "<citetitle>Cinderella</citetitle> (1950), <citetitle>Alice in "
1713 "Wonderland</citetitle> (1951), <citetitle>Robin Hood</citetitle> (1952), "
1714 "<citetitle>Peter Pan</citetitle> (1953), <citetitle>Lady and the "
1715 "Tramp</citetitle> (1955), <citetitle>Mulan</citetitle> (1998), "
1716 "<citetitle>Sleeping Beauty</citetitle> (1959), <citetitle>101 "
1717 "Dalmatians</citetitle> (1961), <citetitle>The Sword in the Stone</citetitle> "
1718 "(1963), and <citetitle>The Jungle Book</citetitle> (1967)—not to "
1719 "mention a recent example that we should perhaps quickly forget, "
1720 "<citetitle>Treasure Planet</citetitle> (2003). In all of these cases, Disney "
1721 "(or Disney, Inc.) ripped creativity from the culture around him, mixed that "
1722 "creativity with his own extraordinary talent, and then burned that mix into "
1723 "the soul of his culture. Rip, mix, and burn."
1726 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1727 #: freeculture.xml:1349
1729 "This is a kind of creativity. It is a creativity that we should remember and "
1730 "celebrate. There are some who would say that there is no creativity except "
1731 "this kind. We don't need to go that far to recognize its importance. We "
1732 "could call this \"Disney creativity,\" though that would be a bit "
1733 "misleading. It is, more precisely, \"Walt Disney creativity\"—a form "
1734 "of expression and genius that builds upon the culture around us and makes it "
1735 "something different."
1739 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
1740 #: freeculture.xml:1363
1742 "Until 1976, copyright law granted an author the possibility of two terms: an "
1743 "initial term and a renewal term. I have calculated the \"average\" term by "
1744 "determining the weighted average of total registrations for any particular "
1745 "year, and the proportion renewing. Thus, if 100 copyrights are registered in "
1746 "year 1, and only 15 are renewed, and the renewal term is 28 years, then the "
1747 "average term is 32.2 years. For the renewal data and other relevant data, "
1748 "see the Web site associated with this book, available at <ulink "
1749 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #6</ulink>."
1752 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1753 #: freeculture.xml:1357
1755 "In 1928, the culture that Disney was free to draw upon was relatively "
1756 "fresh. The public domain in 1928 was not very old and was therefore quite "
1757 "vibrant. The average term of copyright was just around thirty "
1758 "years—for that minority of creative work that was in fact "
1759 "copyrighted.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> That means that for "
1760 "thirty years, on average, the authors or copyright holders of a creative "
1761 "work had an \"exclusive right\" to control certain uses of the work. To use "
1762 "this copyrighted work in limited ways required the permission of the "
1766 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1767 #: freeculture.xml:1380
1769 "At the end of a copyright term, a work passes into the public domain. No "
1770 "permission is then needed to draw upon or use that work. No permission and, "
1771 "hence, no lawyers. The public domain is a \"lawyer-free zone.\" Thus, most "
1772 "of the content from the nineteenth century was free for Disney to use and "
1773 "build upon in 1928. It was free for anyone— whether connected or not, "
1774 "whether rich or not, whether approved or not—to use and build upon."
1778 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1779 #: freeculture.xml:1389
1781 "This is the ways things always were—until quite recently. For most of "
1782 "our history, the public domain was just over the horizon. From until 1978, "
1783 "the average copyright term was never more than thirty-two years, meaning "
1784 "that most culture just a generation and a half old was free for anyone to "
1785 "build upon without the permission of anyone else. Today's equivalent would "
1786 "be for creative work from the 1960s and 1970s to now be free for the next "
1787 "Walt Disney to build upon without permission. Yet today, the public domain "
1788 "is presumptive only for content from before the Great Depression."
1791 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1792 #: freeculture.xml:1402
1794 "Of course, Walt Disney had no monopoly on \"Walt Disney creativity.\" Nor "
1795 "does America. The norm of free culture has, until recently, and except "
1796 "within totalitarian nations, been broadly exploited and quite universal."
1799 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1800 #: freeculture.xml:1408
1802 "Consider, for example, a form of creativity that seems strange to many "
1803 "Americans but that is inescapable within Japanese culture: "
1804 "<citetitle>manga</citetitle>, or comics. The Japanese are fanatics about "
1805 "comics. Some 40 percent of publications are comics, and 30 percent of "
1806 "publication revenue derives from comics. They are everywhere in Japanese "
1807 "society, at every magazine stand, carried by a large proportion of commuters "
1808 "on Japan's extraordinary system of public transportation."
1811 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1812 #: freeculture.xml:1417
1814 "Americans tend to look down upon this form of culture. That's an "
1815 "unattractive characteristic of ours. We're likely to misunderstand much "
1816 "about manga, because few of us have ever read anything close to the stories "
1817 "that these \"graphic novels\" tell. For the Japanese, manga cover every "
1818 "aspect of social life. For us, comics are \"men in tights.\" And anyway, "
1819 "it's not as if the New York subways are filled with readers of Joyce or even "
1820 "Hemingway. People of different cultures distract themselves in different "
1821 "ways, the Japanese in this interestingly different way."
1824 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1825 #: freeculture.xml:1428
1827 "But my purpose here is not to understand manga. It is to describe a variant "
1828 "on manga that from a lawyer's perspective is quite odd, but from a Disney "
1829 "perspective is quite familiar."
1833 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1834 #: freeculture.xml:1433
1836 "This is the phenomenon of <citetitle>doujinshi</citetitle>. Doujinshi are "
1837 "also comics, but they are a kind of copycat comic. A rich ethic governs the "
1838 "creation of doujinshi. It is not doujinshi if it is "
1839 "<emphasis>just</emphasis> a copy; the artist must make a contribution to the "
1840 "art he copies, by transforming it either subtly or significantly. A "
1841 "doujinshi comic can thus take a mainstream comic and develop it "
1842 "differently—with a different story line. Or the comic can keep the "
1843 "character in character but change its look slightly. There is no formula for "
1844 "what makes the doujinshi sufficiently \"different.\" But they must be "
1845 "different if they are to be considered true doujinshi. Indeed, there are "
1846 "committees that review doujinshi for inclusion within shows and reject any "
1847 "copycat comic that is merely a copy."
1850 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1851 #: freeculture.xml:1448
1853 "These copycat comics are not a tiny part of the manga market. They are "
1854 "huge. More than 33,000 \"circles\" of creators from across Japan produce "
1855 "these bits of Walt Disney creativity. More than 450,000 Japanese come "
1856 "together twice a year, in the largest public gathering in the country, to "
1857 "exchange and sell them. This market exists in parallel to the mainstream "
1858 "commercial manga market. In some ways, it obviously competes with that "
1859 "market, but there is no sustained effort by those who control the commercial "
1860 "manga market to shut the doujinshi market down. It flourishes, despite the "
1861 "competition and despite the law."
1864 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1865 #: freeculture.xml:1459
1867 "The most puzzling feature of the doujinshi market, for those trained in the "
1868 "law, at least, is that it is allowed to exist at all. Under Japanese "
1869 "copyright law, which in this respect (on paper) mirrors American copyright "
1870 "law, the doujinshi market is an illegal one. Doujinshi are plainly "
1871 "\"derivative works.\" There is no general practice by doujinshi artists of "
1872 "securing the permission of the manga creators. Instead, the practice is "
1873 "simply to take and modify the creations of others, as Walt Disney did with "
1874 "<citetitle>Steamboat Bill, Jr</citetitle>. Under both Japanese and American "
1875 "law, that \"taking\" without the permission of the original copyright owner "
1876 "is illegal. It is an infringement of the original copyright to make a copy "
1877 "or a derivative work without the original copyright owner's permission."
1880 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
1881 #: freeculture.xml:1473
1882 msgid "Winick, Judd"
1886 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
1887 #: freeculture.xml:1486
1889 "For an excellent history, see Scott McCloud, <citetitle>Reinventing "
1890 "Comics</citetitle> (New York: Perennial, 2000)."
1893 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1894 #: freeculture.xml:1476
1896 "Yet this illegal market exists and indeed flourishes in Japan, and in the "
1897 "view of many, it is precisely because it exists that Japanese manga "
1898 "flourish. As American graphic novelist Judd Winick said to me, \"The early "
1899 "days of comics in America are very much like what's going on in Japan "
1900 "now. . . . American comics were born out of copying each other. . . . That's "
1901 "how [the artists] learn to draw—by going into comic books and not "
1902 "tracing them, but looking at them and copying them\" and building from "
1903 "them.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
1906 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1907 #: freeculture.xml:1491
1909 "American comics now are quite different, Winick explains, in part because of "
1910 "the legal difficulty of adapting comics the way doujinshi are "
1911 "allowed. Speaking of Superman, Winick told me, \"there are these rules and "
1912 "you have to stick to them.\" There are things Superman \"cannot\" do. \"As a "
1913 "creator, it's frustrating having to stick to some parameters which are fifty "
1918 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
1919 #: freeculture.xml:1508
1921 "See Salil K. Mehra, \"Copyright and Comics in Japan: Does Law Explain Why "
1922 "All the Comics My Kid Watches Are Japanese Imports?\" <citetitle>Rutgers Law "
1923 "Review</citetitle> 55 (2002): 155, 182. \"[T]here might be a collective "
1924 "economic rationality that would lead manga and anime artists to forgo "
1925 "bringing legal actions for infringement. One hypothesis is that all manga "
1926 "artists may be better off collectively if they set aside their individual "
1927 "self-interest and decide not to press their legal rights. This is "
1928 "essentially a prisoner's dilemma solved.\""
1931 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1932 #: freeculture.xml:1500
1934 "The norm in Japan mitigates this legal difficulty. Some say it is precisely "
1935 "the benefit accruing to the Japanese manga market that explains the "
1936 "mitigation. Temple University law professor Salil Mehra, for example, "
1937 "hypothesizes that the manga market accepts these technical violations "
1938 "because they spur the manga market to be more wealthy and "
1939 "productive. Everyone would be worse off if doujinshi were banned, so the law "
1940 "does not ban doujinshi.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
1943 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1944 #: freeculture.xml:1519
1946 "The problem with this story, however, as Mehra plainly acknowledges, is that "
1947 "the mechanism producing this laissez faire response is not clear. It may "
1948 "well be that the market as a whole is better off if doujinshi are permitted "
1949 "rather than banned, but that doesn't explain why individual copyright owners "
1950 "don't sue nonetheless. If the law has no general exception for doujinshi, "
1951 "and indeed in some cases individual manga artists have sued doujinshi "
1952 "artists, why is there not a more general pattern of blocking this \"free "
1953 "taking\" by the doujinshi culture?"
1956 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1957 #: freeculture.xml:1530
1959 "I spent four wonderful months in Japan, and I asked this question as often "
1960 "as I could. Perhaps the best account in the end was offered by a friend from "
1961 "a major Japanese law firm. \"We don't have enough lawyers,\" he told me one "
1962 "afternoon. There \"just aren't enough resources to prosecute cases like "
1967 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1968 #: freeculture.xml:1537
1970 "This is a theme to which we will return: that regulation by law is a "
1971 "function of both the words on the books and the costs of making those words "
1972 "have effect. For now, focus on the obvious question that is begged: Would "
1973 "Japan be better off with more lawyers? Would manga be richer if doujinshi "
1974 "artists were regularly prosecuted? Would the Japanese gain something "
1975 "important if they could end this practice of uncompensated sharing? Does "
1976 "piracy here hurt the victims of the piracy, or does it help them? Would "
1977 "lawyers fighting this piracy help their clients or hurt them? Let's pause "
1981 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
1982 #: freeculture.xml:1550
1984 "If you're like I was a decade ago, or like most people are when they first "
1985 "start thinking about these issues, then just about now you should be puzzled "
1986 "about something you hadn't thought through before."
1989 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
1990 #: freeculture.xml:1567 freeculture.xml:2750 freeculture.xml:4362 freeculture.xml:4589 freeculture.xml:7145 freeculture.xml:8206
1991 msgid "Vaidhyanathan, Siva"
1994 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
1995 #: freeculture.xml:1560
1997 "The term <citetitle>intellectual property</citetitle> is of relatively "
1998 "recent origin. See Siva Vaidhyanathan, <citetitle>Copyrights and "
1999 "Copywrongs</citetitle>, 11 (New York: New York University Press, 2001). See "
2000 "also Lawrence Lessig, <citetitle>The Future of Ideas</citetitle> (New York: "
2001 "Random House, 2001), 293 n. 26. The term accurately describes a set of "
2002 "\"property\" rights—copyright, patents, trademark, and "
2003 "trade-secret—but the nature of those rights is very different. "
2004 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
2007 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2008 #: freeculture.xml:1555
2010 "We live in a world that celebrates \"property.\" I am one of those "
2011 "celebrants. I believe in the value of property in general, and I also "
2012 "believe in the value of that weird form of property that lawyers call "
2013 "\"intellectual property.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> A large, "
2014 "diverse society cannot survive without property; a large, diverse, and "
2015 "modern society cannot flourish without intellectual property."
2018 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2019 #: freeculture.xml:1574
2021 "But it takes just a second's reflection to realize that there is plenty of "
2022 "value out there that \"property\" doesn't capture. I don't mean \"money "
2023 "can't buy you love,\" but rather, value that is plainly part of a process of "
2024 "production, including commercial as well as noncommercial production. If "
2025 "Disney animators had stolen a set of pencils to draw Steamboat Willie, we'd "
2026 "have no hesitation in condemning that taking as wrong— even though "
2027 "trivial, even if unnoticed. Yet there was nothing wrong, at least under the "
2028 "law of the day, with Disney's taking from Buster Keaton or from the Brothers "
2029 "Grimm. There was nothing wrong with the taking from Keaton because Disney's "
2030 "use would have been considered \"fair.\" There was nothing wrong with the "
2031 "taking from the Grimms because the Grimms' work was in the public domain."
2035 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2036 #: freeculture.xml:1589
2038 "Thus, even though the things that Disney took—or more generally, the "
2039 "things taken by anyone exercising Walt Disney creativity—are valuable, "
2040 "our tradition does not treat those takings as wrong. Some things remain free "
2041 "for the taking within a free culture, and that freedom is good."
2044 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2045 #: freeculture.xml:1598
2047 "The same with the doujinshi culture. If a doujinshi artist broke into a "
2048 "publisher's office and ran off with a thousand copies of his latest "
2049 "work—or even one copy—without paying, we'd have no hesitation in "
2050 "saying the artist was wrong. In addition to having trespassed, he would have "
2051 "stolen something of value. The law bans that stealing in whatever form, "
2052 "whether large or small."
2055 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2056 #: freeculture.xml:1606
2058 "Yet there is an obvious reluctance, even among Japanese lawyers, to say that "
2059 "the copycat comic artists are \"stealing.\" This form of Walt Disney "
2060 "creativity is seen as fair and right, even if lawyers in particular find it "
2064 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2065 #: freeculture.xml:1612
2067 "It's the same with a thousand examples that appear everywhere once you begin "
2068 "to look. Scientists build upon the work of other scientists without asking "
2069 "or paying for the privilege. (\"Excuse me, Professor Einstein, but may I "
2070 "have permission to use your theory of relativity to show that you were wrong "
2071 "about quantum physics?\") Acting companies perform adaptations of the works "
2072 "of Shakespeare without securing permission from anyone. (Does "
2073 "<emphasis>anyone</emphasis> believe Shakespeare would be better spread "
2074 "within our culture if there were a central Shakespeare rights clearinghouse "
2075 "that all productions of Shakespeare must appeal to first?) And Hollywood "
2076 "goes through cycles with a certain kind of movie: five asteroid films in the "
2077 "late 1990s; two volcano disaster films in 1997."
2081 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2082 #: freeculture.xml:1626
2084 "Creators here and everywhere are always and at all times building upon the "
2085 "creativity that went before and that surrounds them now. That building is "
2086 "always and everywhere at least partially done without permission and without "
2087 "compensating the original creator. No society, free or controlled, has ever "
2088 "demanded that every use be paid for or that permission for Walt Disney "
2089 "creativity must always be sought. Instead, every society has left a certain "
2090 "bit of its culture free for the taking—free societies more fully than "
2091 "unfree, perhaps, but all societies to some degree."
2094 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2095 #: freeculture.xml:1637
2097 "The hard question is therefore not <emphasis>whether</emphasis> a culture is "
2098 "free. All cultures are free to some degree. The hard question instead is "
2099 "\"<emphasis>How</emphasis> free is this culture?\" How much, and how "
2100 "broadly, is the culture free for others to take and build upon? Is that "
2101 "freedom limited to party members? To members of the royal family? To the top "
2102 "ten corporations on the New York Stock Exchange? Or is that freedom spread "
2103 "broadly? To artists generally, whether affiliated with the Met or not? To "
2104 "musicians generally, whether white or not? To filmmakers generally, whether "
2105 "affiliated with a studio or not?"
2108 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2109 #: freeculture.xml:1649
2111 "Free cultures are cultures that leave a great deal open for others to build "
2112 "upon; unfree, or permission, cultures leave much less. Ours was a free "
2113 "culture. It is becoming much less so."
2116 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
2117 #: freeculture.xml:1657
2118 msgid "CHAPTER TWO: \"Mere Copyists\""
2121 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
2122 #: freeculture.xml:1658
2123 msgid "Daguerre, Louis"
2126 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2127 #: freeculture.xml:1660
2129 "In 1839, Louis Daguerre invented the first practical technology for "
2130 "producing what we would call \"photographs.\" Appropriately enough, they "
2131 "were called \"daguerreotypes.\" The process was complicated and expensive, "
2132 "and the field was thus limited to professionals and a few zealous and "
2133 "wealthy amateurs. (There was even an American Daguerre Association that "
2134 "helped regulate the industry, as do all such associations, by keeping "
2135 "competition down so as to keep prices up.)"
2138 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2139 #: freeculture.xml:1669
2141 "Yet despite high prices, the demand for daguerreotypes was strong. This "
2142 "pushed inventors to find simpler and cheaper ways to make \"automatic "
2143 "pictures.\" William Talbot soon discovered a process for making "
2144 "\"negatives.\" But because the negatives were glass, and had to be kept wet, "
2145 "the process still remained expensive and cumbersome. In the 1870s, dry "
2146 "plates were developed, making it easier to separate the taking of a picture "
2147 "from its developing. These were still plates of glass, and thus it was still "
2148 "not a process within reach of most amateurs."
2151 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
2152 #: freeculture.xml:1680
2153 msgid "Eastman, George"
2157 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2158 #: freeculture.xml:1683
2160 "The technological change that made mass photography possible didn't happen "
2161 "until 1888, and was the creation of a single man. George Eastman, himself an "
2162 "amateur photographer, was frustrated by the technology of photographs made "
2163 "with plates. In a flash of insight (so to speak), Eastman saw that if the "
2164 "film could be made to be flexible, it could be held on a single "
2165 "spindle. That roll could then be sent to a developer, driving the costs of "
2166 "photography down substantially. By lowering the costs, Eastman expected he "
2167 "could dramatically broaden the population of photographers."
2171 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2172 #: freeculture.xml:1700
2174 "Reese V. Jenkins, <citetitle>Images and Enterprise</citetitle> (Baltimore: "
2175 "Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975), 112."
2178 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2179 #: freeculture.xml:1695
2181 "Eastman developed flexible, emulsion-coated paper film and placed rolls of "
2182 "it in small, simple cameras: the Kodak. The device was marketed on the basis "
2183 "of its simplicity. \"You press the button and we do the rest.\"<placeholder "
2184 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> As he described in <citetitle>The Kodak "
2185 "Primer</citetitle>:"
2188 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
2189 #: freeculture.xml:1718 freeculture.xml:1741
2193 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
2194 #: freeculture.xml:1716
2196 "Brian Coe, <citetitle>The Birth of Photography</citetitle> (New York: "
2197 "Taplinger Publishing, 1977), 53. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
2200 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
2201 #: freeculture.xml:1705
2203 "The principle of the Kodak system is the separation of the work that any "
2204 "person whomsoever can do in making a photograph, from the work that only an "
2205 "expert can do. . . . We furnish anybody, man, woman or child, who has "
2206 "sufficient intelligence to point a box straight and press a button, with an "
2207 "instrument which altogether removes from the practice of photography the "
2208 "necessity for exceptional facilities or, in fact, any special knowledge of "
2209 "the art. It can be employed without preliminary study, without a darkroom "
2210 "and without chemicals.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
2214 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2215 #: freeculture.xml:1734
2216 msgid "Jenkins, 177."
2220 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2221 #: freeculture.xml:1738
2222 msgid "Based on a chart in Jenkins, p. 178."
2225 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2226 #: freeculture.xml:1723
2228 "For $25, anyone could make pictures. The camera came preloaded with film, "
2229 "and when it had been used, the camera was returned to an Eastman factory, "
2230 "where the film was developed. Over time, of course, the cost of the camera "
2231 "and the ease with which it could be used both improved. Roll film thus "
2232 "became the basis for the explosive growth of popular photography. Eastman's "
2233 "camera first went on sale in 1888; one year later, Kodak was printing more "
2234 "than six thousand negatives a day. From 1888 through 1909, while industrial "
2235 "production was rising by 4.7 percent, photographic equipment and material "
2236 "sales increased by percent.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Eastman "
2237 "Kodak's sales during the same period experienced an average annual increase "
2238 "of over 17 percent.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/>"
2242 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2243 #: freeculture.xml:1756
2247 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2248 #: freeculture.xml:1745
2250 "The real significance of Eastman's invention, however, was not economic. It "
2251 "was social. Professional photography gave individuals a glimpse of places "
2252 "they would never otherwise see. Amateur photography gave them the ability to "
2253 "record their own lives in a way they had never been able to do before. As "
2254 "author Brian Coe notes, \"For the first time the snapshot album provided the "
2255 "man on the street with a permanent record of his family and its "
2256 "activities. . . . For the first time in history there exists an authentic "
2257 "visual record of the appearance and activities of the common man made "
2258 "without [literary] interpretation or bias.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
2262 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2263 #: freeculture.xml:1760
2265 "In this way, the Kodak camera and film were technologies of expression. The "
2266 "pencil or paintbrush was also a technology of expression, of course. But it "
2267 "took years of training before they could be deployed by amateurs in any "
2268 "useful or effective way. With the Kodak, expression was possible much sooner "
2269 "and more simply. The barrier to expression was lowered. Snobs would sneer at "
2270 "its \"quality\"; professionals would discount it as irrelevant. But watch a "
2271 "child study how best to frame a picture and you get a sense of the "
2272 "experience of creativity that the Kodak enabled. Democratic tools gave "
2273 "ordinary people a way to express themselves more easily than any tools could "
2278 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2279 #: freeculture.xml:1782
2281 "For illustrative cases, see, for example, <citetitle>Pavesich</citetitle> "
2282 "v. <citetitle>N.E. Life Ins. Co</citetitle>., 50 S.E. 68 (Ga. 1905); "
2283 "<citetitle>Foster-Milburn Co</citetitle>. v. <citetitle>Chinn</citetitle>, "
2284 "123090 S.W. 364, 366 (Ky. 1909); <citetitle>Corliss</citetitle> "
2285 "v. <citetitle>Walker</citetitle>, 64 F. 280 (Mass. Dist. Ct. 1894)."
2288 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2289 #: freeculture.xml:1773
2291 "What was required for this technology to flourish? Obviously, Eastman's "
2292 "genius was an important part. But also important was the legal environment "
2293 "within which Eastman's invention grew. For early in the history of "
2294 "photography, there was a series of judicial decisions that could well have "
2295 "changed the course of photography substantially. Courts were asked whether "
2296 "the photographer, amateur or professional, required permission before he "
2297 "could capture and print whatever image he wanted. Their answer was "
2298 "no.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
2302 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2303 #: freeculture.xml:1790
2305 "The arguments in favor of requiring permission will sound surprisingly "
2306 "familiar. The photographer was \"taking\" something from the person or "
2307 "building whose photograph he shot—pirating something of value. Some "
2308 "even thought he was taking the target's soul. Just as Disney was not free to "
2309 "take the pencils that his animators used to draw Mickey, so, too, should "
2310 "these photographers not be free to take images that they thought valuable."
2313 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
2314 #: freeculture.xml:1812
2315 msgid "Warren, Samuel D."
2318 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2319 #: freeculture.xml:1809
2321 "Samuel D. Warren and Louis D. Brandeis, \"The Right to Privacy,\" "
2322 "<citetitle>Harvard Law Review</citetitle> 4 (1890): 193. <placeholder "
2323 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
2326 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2327 #: freeculture.xml:1802
2329 "On the other side was an argument that should be familiar, as well. Sure, "
2330 "there may be something of value being used. But citizens should have the "
2331 "right to capture at least those images that stand in public view. (Louis "
2332 "Brandeis, who would become a Supreme Court Justice, thought the rule should "
2333 "be different for images from private spaces.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
2334 "id=\"0\"/>) It may be that this means that the photographer gets something "
2335 "for nothing. Just as Disney could take inspiration from <citetitle>Steamboat "
2336 "Bill, Jr</citetitle>. or the Brothers Grimm, the photographer should be free "
2337 "to capture an image without compensating the source."
2341 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2342 #: freeculture.xml:1829
2344 "See Melville B. Nimmer, \"The Right of Publicity,\" <citetitle>Law and "
2345 "Contemporary Problems</citetitle> 19 (1954): 203; William L. Prosser, "
2346 "\"Privacy,\" <citetitle>California Law Review</citetitle> 48 (1960) "
2347 "398–407; <citetitle>White</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Samsung "
2348 "Electronics America, Inc</citetitle>., 971 F. 2d 1395 (9th Cir. 1992), "
2349 "cert. denied, 508 U.S. 951 (1993)."
2352 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2353 #: freeculture.xml:1819
2355 "Fortunately for Mr. Eastman, and for photography in general, these early "
2356 "decisions went in favor of the pirates. In general, no permission would be "
2357 "required before an image could be captured and shared with others. Instead, "
2358 "permission was presumed. Freedom was the default. (The law would eventually "
2359 "craft an exception for famous people: commercial photographers who snap "
2360 "pictures of famous people for commercial purposes have more restrictions "
2361 "than the rest of us. But in the ordinary case, the image can be captured "
2362 "without clearing the rights to do the capturing.<placeholder "
2363 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>)"
2366 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2367 #: freeculture.xml:1837
2369 "We can only speculate about how photography would have developed had the law "
2370 "gone the other way. If the presumption had been against the photographer, "
2371 "then the photographer would have had to demonstrate permission. Perhaps "
2372 "Eastman Kodak would have had to demonstrate permission, too, before it "
2373 "developed the film upon which images were captured. After all, if permission "
2374 "were not granted, then Eastman Kodak would be benefiting from the \"theft\" "
2375 "committed by the photographer. Just as Napster benefited from the copyright "
2376 "infringements committed by Napster users, Kodak would be benefiting from the "
2377 "\"image-right\" infringement of its photographers. We could imagine the law "
2378 "then requiring that some form of permission be demonstrated before a company "
2379 "developed pictures. We could imagine a system developing to demonstrate that "
2384 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2385 #: freeculture.xml:1854
2387 "But though we could imagine this system of permission, it would be very hard "
2388 "to see how photography could have flourished as it did if the requirement "
2389 "for permission had been built into the rules that govern it. Photography "
2390 "would have existed. It would have grown in importance over "
2391 "time. Professionals would have continued to use the technology as they "
2392 "did—since professionals could have more easily borne the burdens of "
2393 "the permission system. But the spread of photography to ordinary people "
2394 "would not have occurred. Nothing like that growth would have been "
2395 "realized. And certainly, nothing like that growth in a democratic technology "
2396 "of expression would have been realized. If you drive through San "
2397 "Francisco's Presidio, you might see two gaudy yellow school buses painted "
2398 "over with colorful and striking images, and the logo \"Just Think!\" in "
2399 "place of the name of a school. But there's little that's \"just\" cerebral "
2400 "in the projects that these busses enable. These buses are filled with "
2401 "technologies that teach kids to tinker with film. Not the film of "
2402 "Eastman. Not even the film of your VCR. Rather the \"film\" of digital "
2403 "cameras. Just Think! is a project that enables kids to make films, as a way "
2404 "to understand and critique the filmed culture that they find all around "
2405 "them. Each year, these busses travel to more than thirty schools and enable "
2406 "three hundred to five hundred children to learn something about media by "
2407 "doing something with media. By doing, they think. By tinkering, they learn."
2411 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2412 #: freeculture.xml:1886
2414 "H. Edward Goldberg, \"Essential Presentation Tools: Hardware and Software "
2415 "You Need to Create Digital Multimedia Presentations,\" cadalyst, February "
2416 "2002, available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
2420 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2421 #: freeculture.xml:1880
2423 "These buses are not cheap, but the technology they carry is increasingly "
2424 "so. The cost of a high-quality digital video system has fallen "
2425 "dramatically. As one analyst puts it, \"Five years ago, a good real-time "
2426 "digital video editing system cost $25,000. Today you can get professional "
2427 "quality for $595.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> These buses are "
2428 "filled with technology that would have cost hundreds of thousands just ten "
2429 "years ago. And it is now feasible to imagine not just buses like this, but "
2430 "classrooms across the country where kids are learning more and more of "
2431 "something teachers call \"media literacy.\""
2434 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
2435 #: freeculture.xml:1903
2436 msgid "Yanofsky, Dave"
2439 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2440 #: freeculture.xml:1898
2442 "\"Media literacy,\" as Dave Yanofsky, the executive director of Just Think!, "
2443 "puts it, \"is the ability . . . to understand, analyze, and deconstruct "
2444 "media images. Its aim is to make [kids] literate about the way media works, "
2445 "the way it's constructed, the way it's delivered, and the way people access "
2446 "it.\" <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
2449 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2450 #: freeculture.xml:1906
2452 "This may seem like an odd way to think about \"literacy.\" For most people, "
2453 "literacy is about reading and writing. Faulkner and Hemingway and noticing "
2454 "split infinitives are the things that \"literate\" people know about."
2458 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2459 #: freeculture.xml:1916
2461 "Judith Van Evra, <citetitle>Television and Child Development</citetitle> "
2462 "(Hillsdale, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1990); \"Findings on Family "
2463 "and TV Study,\" <citetitle>Denver Post</citetitle>, 25 May 1997, B6."
2466 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2467 #: freeculture.xml:1912
2469 "Maybe. But in a world where children see on average 390 hours of television "
2470 "commercials per year, or between 20,000 and 45,000 commercials "
2471 "generally,<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> it is increasingly "
2472 "important to understand the \"grammar\" of media. For just as there is a "
2473 "grammar for the written word, so, too, is there one for media. And just as "
2474 "kids learn how to write by writing lots of terrible prose, kids learn how to "
2475 "write media by constructing lots of (at least at first) terrible media."
2478 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2479 #: freeculture.xml:1927
2481 "A growing field of academics and activists sees this form of literacy as "
2482 "crucial to the next generation of culture. For though anyone who has written "
2483 "understands how difficult writing is—how difficult it is to sequence "
2484 "the story, to keep a reader's attention, to craft language to be "
2485 "understandable—few of us have any real sense of how difficult media "
2486 "is. Or more fundamentally, few of us have a sense of how media works, how it "
2487 "holds an audience or leads it through a story, how it triggers emotion or "
2491 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2492 #: freeculture.xml:1937
2494 "It took filmmaking a generation before it could do these things well. But "
2495 "even then, the knowledge was in the filming, not in writing about the "
2496 "film. The skill came from experiencing the making of a film, not from "
2497 "reading a book about it. One learns to write by writing and then reflecting "
2498 "upon what one has written. One learns to write with images by making them "
2499 "and then reflecting upon what one has created."
2502 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
2503 #: freeculture.xml:1944
2504 msgid "Crichton, Michael"
2507 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
2508 #: freeculture.xml:1958 freeculture.xml:2018 freeculture.xml:2025 freeculture.xml:2460
2509 msgid "Barish, Stephanie"
2512 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
2513 #: freeculture.xml:1959
2514 msgid "Daley, Elizabeth"
2517 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2518 #: freeculture.xml:1956
2520 "Interview with Elizabeth Daley and Stephanie Barish, 13 December 2002. "
2521 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
2526 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2527 #: freeculture.xml:1970
2529 "See Scott Steinberg, \"Crichton Gets Medieval on PCs,\" E!online, 4 November "
2530 "2000, available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
2531 "#8</ulink>; \"Timeline,\" 22 November 2000, available at <ulink "
2532 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #9</ulink>."
2535 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2536 #: freeculture.xml:1946
2538 "This grammar has changed as media has changed. When it was just film, as "
2539 "Elizabeth Daley, executive director of the University of Southern "
2540 "California's Annenberg Center for Communication and dean of the USC School "
2541 "of Cinema-Television, explained to me, the grammar was about \"the placement "
2542 "of objects, color, . . . rhythm, pacing, and texture.\"<placeholder "
2543 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> But as computers open up an interactive space "
2544 "where a story is \"played\" as well as experienced, that grammar "
2545 "changes. The simple control of narrative is lost, and so other techniques "
2546 "are necessary. Author Michael Crichton had mastered the narrative of science "
2547 "fiction. But when he tried to design a computer game based on one of his "
2548 "works, it was a new craft he had to learn. How to lead people through a game "
2549 "without their feeling they have been led was not obvious, even to a wildly "
2550 "successful author.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/>"
2553 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
2554 #: freeculture.xml:1977
2555 msgid "computer games"
2558 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2559 #: freeculture.xml:1979
2561 "This skill is precisely the craft a filmmaker learns. As Daley describes, "
2562 "\"people are very surprised about how they are led through a film. [I]t is "
2563 "perfectly constructed to keep you from seeing it, so you have no idea. If a "
2564 "filmmaker succeeds you do not know how you were led.\" If you know you were "
2565 "led through a film, the film has failed."
2568 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2569 #: freeculture.xml:1986
2571 "Yet the push for an expanded literacy—one that goes beyond text to "
2572 "include audio and visual elements—is not about making better film "
2573 "directors. The aim is not to improve the profession of filmmaking at all. "
2574 "Instead, as Daley explained,"
2577 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
2578 #: freeculture.xml:1993
2580 "From my perspective, probably the most important digital divide is not "
2581 "access to a box. It's the ability to be empowered with the language that "
2582 "that box works in. Otherwise only a very few people can write with this "
2583 "language, and all the rest of us are reduced to being read-only."
2586 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2587 #: freeculture.xml:2001
2589 "\"Read-only.\" Passive recipients of culture produced elsewhere. Couch "
2590 "potatoes. Consumers. This is the world of media from the twentieth century."
2593 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2594 #: freeculture.xml:2017
2595 msgid "Interview with Daley and Barish. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
2599 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
2600 #: freeculture.xml:2022 freeculture.xml:3734 freeculture.xml:4775 freeculture.xml:7933
2604 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2605 #: freeculture.xml:2006
2607 "The twenty-first century could be different. This is the crucial point: It "
2608 "could be both read and write. Or at least reading and better understanding "
2609 "the craft of writing. Or best, reading and understanding the tools that "
2610 "enable the writing to lead or mislead. The aim of any literacy, and this "
2611 "literacy in particular, is to \"empower people to choose the appropriate "
2612 "language for what they need to create or express.\"<placeholder "
2613 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> It is to enable students \"to communicate in "
2614 "the language of the twenty-first century.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
2618 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2619 #: freeculture.xml:2027
2621 "As with any language, this language comes more easily to some than to "
2622 "others. It doesn't necessarily come more easily to those who excel in "
2623 "written language. Daley and Stephanie Barish, director of the Institute for "
2624 "Multimedia Literacy at the Annenberg Center, describe one particularly "
2625 "poignant example of a project they ran in a high school. The high school "
2626 "was a very poor inner-city Los Angeles school. In all the traditional "
2627 "measures of success, this school was a failure. But Daley and Barish ran a "
2628 "program that gave kids an opportunity to use film to express meaning about "
2629 "something the students know something about—gun violence."
2632 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2633 #: freeculture.xml:2039
2635 "The class was held on Friday afternoons, and it created a relatively new "
2636 "problem for the school. While the challenge in most classes was getting the "
2637 "kids to come, the challenge in this class was keeping them away. The \"kids "
2638 "were showing up at 6 A.M. and leaving at 5 at night,\" said Barish. They "
2639 "were working harder than in any other class to do what education should be "
2640 "about—learning how to express themselves."
2643 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2644 #: freeculture.xml:2047
2646 "Using whatever \"free web stuff they could find,\" and relatively simple "
2647 "tools to enable the kids to mix \"image, sound, and text,\" Barish said this "
2648 "class produced a series of projects that showed something about gun violence "
2649 "that few would otherwise understand. This was an issue close to the lives of "
2650 "these students. The project \"gave them a tool and empowered them to be able "
2651 "to both understand it and talk about it,\" Barish explained. That tool "
2652 "succeeded in creating expression—far more successfully and powerfully "
2653 "than could have been created using only text. \"If you had said to these "
2654 "students, `you have to do it in text,' they would've just thrown their hands "
2655 "up and gone and done something else,\" Barish described, in part, no doubt, "
2656 "because expressing themselves in text is not something these students can do "
2657 "well. Yet neither is text a form in which <emphasis>these</emphasis> ideas "
2658 "can be expressed well. The power of this message depended upon its "
2659 "connection to this form of expression."
2663 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2664 #: freeculture.xml:2066
2666 "\"But isn't education about teaching kids to write?\" I asked. In part, of "
2667 "course, it is. But why are we teaching kids to write? Education, Daley "
2668 "explained, is about giving students a way of \"constructing meaning.\" To "
2669 "say that that means just writing is like saying teaching writing is only "
2670 "about teaching kids how to spell. Text is one part—and increasingly, "
2671 "not the most powerful part—of constructing meaning. As Daley explained "
2672 "in the most moving part of our interview,"
2675 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
2676 #: freeculture.xml:2077
2678 "What you want is to give these students ways of constructing meaning. If all "
2679 "you give them is text, they're not going to do it. Because they can't. You "
2680 "know, you've got Johnny who can look at a video, he can play a video game, "
2681 "he can do graffiti all over your walls, he can take your car apart, and he "
2682 "can do all sorts of other things. He just can't read your text. So Johnny "
2683 "comes to school and you say, \"Johnny, you're illiterate. Nothing you can do "
2684 "matters.\" Well, Johnny then has two choices: He can dismiss you or he [can] "
2685 "dismiss himself. If his ego is healthy at all, he's going to dismiss "
2686 "you. [But i]nstead, if you say, \"Well, with all these things that you can "
2687 "do, let's talk about this issue. Play for me music that you think reflects "
2688 "that, or show me images that you think reflect that, or draw for me "
2689 "something that reflects that.\" Not by giving a kid a video camera and "
2690 ". . . saying, \"Let's go have fun with the video camera and make a little "
2691 "movie.\" But instead, really help you take these elements that you "
2692 "understand, that are your language, and construct meaning about the "
2696 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
2697 #: freeculture.xml:2096
2699 "That empowers enormously. And then what happens, of course, is eventually, "
2700 "as it has happened in all these classes, they bump up against the fact, \"I "
2701 "need to explain this and I really need to write something.\" And as one of "
2702 "the teachers told Stephanie, they would rewrite a paragraph 5, 6, 7, 8 "
2703 "times, till they got it right."
2707 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
2708 #: freeculture.xml:2103
2710 "Because they needed to. There was a reason for doing it. They needed to say "
2711 "something, as opposed to just jumping through your hoops. They actually "
2712 "needed to use a language that they didn't speak very well. But they had come "
2713 "to understand that they had a lot of power with this language.\""
2716 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2717 #: freeculture.xml:2112
2719 "When two planes crashed into the World Trade Center, another into the "
2720 "Pentagon, and a fourth into a Pennsylvania field, all media around the world "
2721 "shifted to this news. Every moment of just about every day for that week, "
2722 "and for weeks after, television in particular, and media generally, retold "
2723 "the story of the events we had just witnessed. The telling was a retelling, "
2724 "because we had seen the events that were described. The genius of this awful "
2725 "act of terrorism was that the delayed second attack was perfectly timed to "
2726 "assure that the whole world would be watching."
2729 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2730 #: freeculture.xml:2123
2732 "These retellings had an increasingly familiar feel. There was music scored "
2733 "for the intermissions, and fancy graphics that flashed across the "
2734 "screen. There was a formula to interviews. There was \"balance,\" and "
2735 "seriousness. This was news choreographed in the way we have increasingly "
2736 "come to expect it, \"news as entertainment,\" even if the entertainment is "
2740 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
2741 #: freeculture.xml:2130 freeculture.xml:7871
2745 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
2746 #: freeculture.xml:2131
2750 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2751 #: freeculture.xml:2133
2753 "But in addition to this produced news about the \"tragedy of September 11,\" "
2754 "those of us tied to the Internet came to see a very different production as "
2755 "well. The Internet was filled with accounts of the same events. Yet these "
2756 "Internet accounts had a very different flavor. Some people constructed photo "
2757 "pages that captured images from around the world and presented them as slide "
2758 "shows with text. Some offered open letters. There were sound "
2759 "recordings. There was anger and frustration. There were attempts to provide "
2760 "context. There was, in short, an extraordinary worldwide barn raising, in "
2761 "the sense Mike Godwin uses the term in his book <citetitle>Cyber "
2762 "Rights</citetitle>, around a news event that had captured the attention of "
2763 "the world. There was ABC and CBS, but there was also the Internet."
2767 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2768 #: freeculture.xml:2147
2770 "I don't mean simply to praise the Internet—though I do think the "
2771 "people who supported this form of speech should be praised. I mean instead "
2772 "to point to a significance in this form of speech. For like a Kodak, the "
2773 "Internet enables people to capture images. And like in a movie by a student "
2774 "on the \"Just Think!\" bus, the visual images could be mixed with sound or "
2778 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2779 #: freeculture.xml:2157
2781 "But unlike any technology for simply capturing images, the Internet allows "
2782 "these creations to be shared with an extraordinary number of people, "
2783 "practically instantaneously. This is something new in our "
2784 "tradition—not just that culture can be captured mechanically, and "
2785 "obviously not just that events are commented upon critically, but that this "
2786 "mix of captured images, sound, and commentary can be widely spread "
2787 "practically instantaneously."
2790 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2791 #: freeculture.xml:2166
2793 "September 11 was not an aberration. It was a beginning. Around the same "
2794 "time, a form of communication that has grown dramatically was just beginning "
2795 "to come into public consciousness: the Web-log, or blog. The blog is a kind "
2796 "of public diary, and within some cultures, such as in Japan, it functions "
2797 "very much like a diary. In those cultures, it records private facts in a "
2798 "public way—it's a kind of electronic <citetitle>Jerry "
2799 "Springer</citetitle>, available anywhere in the world."
2802 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2803 #: freeculture.xml:2175
2805 "But in the United States, blogs have taken on a very different character. "
2806 "There are some who use the space simply to talk about their private "
2807 "life. But there are many who use the space to engage in public "
2808 "discourse. Discussing matters of public import, criticizing others who are "
2809 "mistaken in their views, criticizing politicians about the decisions they "
2810 "make, offering solutions to problems we all see: blogs create the sense of a "
2811 "virtual public meeting, but one in which we don't all hope to be there at "
2812 "the same time and in which conversations are not necessarily linked. The "
2813 "best of the blog entries are relatively short; they point directly to words "
2814 "used by others, criticizing with or adding to them. They are arguably the "
2815 "most important form of unchoreographed public discourse that we have."
2819 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2820 #: freeculture.xml:2189
2822 "That's a strong statement. Yet it says as much about our democracy as it "
2823 "does about blogs. This is the part of America that is most difficult for "
2824 "those of us who love America to accept: Our democracy has atrophied. Of "
2825 "course we have elections, and most of the time the courts allow those "
2826 "elections to count. A relatively small number of people vote in those "
2827 "elections. The cycle of these elections has become totally professionalized "
2828 "and routinized. Most of us think this is democracy."
2832 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2833 #: freeculture.xml:2215
2835 "See, for example, Alexis de Tocqueville, <citetitle>Democracy in "
2836 "America</citetitle>, bk. 1, trans. Henry Reeve (New York: Bantam Books, "
2840 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2841 #: freeculture.xml:2200
2843 "But democracy has never just been about elections. Democracy means rule by "
2844 "the people, but rule means something more than mere elections. In our "
2845 "tradition, it also means control through reasoned discourse. This was the "
2846 "idea that captured the imagination of Alexis de Tocqueville, the "
2847 "nineteenth-century French lawyer who wrote the most important account of "
2848 "early \"Democracy in America.\" It wasn't popular elections that fascinated "
2849 "him—it was the jury, an institution that gave ordinary people the "
2850 "right to choose life or death for other citizens. And most fascinating for "
2851 "him was that the jury didn't just vote about the outcome they would "
2852 "impose. They deliberated. Members argued about the \"right\" result; they "
2853 "tried to persuade each other of the \"right\" result, and in criminal cases "
2854 "at least, they had to agree upon a unanimous result for the process to come "
2855 "to an end.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
2859 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2860 #: freeculture.xml:2224
2862 "Bruce Ackerman and James Fishkin, \"Deliberation Day,\" <citetitle>Journal "
2863 "of Political Philosophy</citetitle> 10 (2) (2002): 129."
2866 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2867 #: freeculture.xml:2220
2869 "Yet even this institution flags in American life today. And in its place, "
2870 "there is no systematic effort to enable citizen deliberation. Some are "
2871 "pushing to create just such an institution.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
2872 "id=\"0\"/> And in some towns in New England, something close to deliberation "
2873 "remains. But for most of us for most of the time, there is no time or place "
2874 "for \"democratic deliberation\" to occur."
2878 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2879 #: freeculture.xml:2239
2881 "Cass Sunstein, <citetitle>Republic.com</citetitle> (Princeton: Princeton "
2882 "University Press, 2001), 65–80, 175, 182, 183, 192."
2885 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2886 #: freeculture.xml:2232
2888 "More bizarrely, there is generally not even permission for it to occur. We, "
2889 "the most powerful democracy in the world, have developed a strong norm "
2890 "against talking about politics. It's fine to talk about politics with people "
2891 "you agree with. But it is rude to argue about politics with people you "
2892 "disagree with. Political discourse becomes isolated, and isolated discourse "
2893 "becomes more extreme.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> We say what "
2894 "our friends want to hear, and hear very little beyond what our friends say."
2898 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2899 #: freeculture.xml:2245
2901 "Enter the blog. The blog's very architecture solves one part of this "
2902 "problem. People post when they want to post, and people read when they want "
2903 "to read. The most difficult time is synchronous time. Technologies that "
2904 "enable asynchronous communication, such as e-mail, increase the opportunity "
2905 "for communication. Blogs allow for public discourse without the public ever "
2906 "needing to gather in a single public place."
2909 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2910 #: freeculture.xml:2256
2912 "But beyond architecture, blogs also have solved the problem of "
2913 "norms. There's no norm (yet) in blog space not to talk about politics. "
2914 "Indeed, the space is filled with political speech, on both the right and the "
2915 "left. Some of the most popular sites are conservative or libertarian, but "
2916 "there are many of all political stripes. And even blogs that are not "
2917 "political cover political issues when the occasion merits."
2920 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
2921 #: freeculture.xml:2268
2922 msgid "Dean, Howard"
2925 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2926 #: freeculture.xml:2264
2928 "The significance of these blogs is tiny now, though not so tiny. The name "
2929 "Howard Dean may well have faded from the 2004 presidential race but for "
2930 "blogs. Yet even if the number of readers is small, the reading is having an "
2931 "effect. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
2935 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
2936 #: freeculture.xml:2282
2938 "Noah Shachtman, \"With Incessant Postings, a Pundit Stirs the Pot,\" New "
2939 "York Times, 16 January 2003, G5."
2942 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
2943 #: freeculture.xml:2285
2947 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2948 #: freeculture.xml:2271
2950 "One direct effect is on stories that had a different life cycle in the "
2951 "mainstream media. The Trent Lott affair is an example. When Lott "
2952 "\"misspoke\" at a party for Senator Strom Thurmond, essentially praising "
2953 "Thurmond's segregationist policies, he calculated correctly that this story "
2954 "would disappear from the mainstream press within forty-eight hours. It "
2955 "did. But he didn't calculate its life cycle in blog space. The bloggers kept "
2956 "researching the story. Over time, more and more instances of the same "
2957 "\"misspeaking\" emerged. Finally, the story broke back into the mainstream "
2958 "press. In the end, Lott was forced to resign as senate majority "
2959 "leader.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder "
2960 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
2963 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2964 #: freeculture.xml:2288
2966 "This different cycle is possible because the same commercial pressures don't "
2967 "exist with blogs as with other ventures. Television and newspapers are "
2968 "commercial entities. They must work to keep attention. If they lose "
2969 "readers, they lose revenue. Like sharks, they must move on."
2972 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2973 #: freeculture.xml:2295
2975 "But bloggers don't have a similar constraint. They can obsess, they can "
2976 "focus, they can get serious. If a particular blogger writes a particularly "
2977 "interesting story, more and more people link to that story. And as the "
2978 "number of links to a particular story increases, it rises in the ranks of "
2979 "stories. People read what is popular; what is popular has been selected by a "
2980 "very democratic process of peer-generated rankings."
2983 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
2984 #: freeculture.xml:2304
2989 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
2990 #: freeculture.xml:2307
2992 "There's a second way, as well, in which blogs have a different cycle from "
2993 "the mainstream press. As Dave Winer, one of the fathers of this movement and "
2994 "a software author for many decades, told me, another difference is the "
2995 "absence of a financial \"conflict of interest.\" \"I think you have to take "
2996 "the conflict of interest\" out of journalism, Winer told me. \"An amateur "
2997 "journalist simply doesn't have a conflict of interest, or the conflict of "
2998 "interest is so easily disclosed that you know you can sort of get it out of "
3002 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
3003 #: freeculture.xml:2317 freeculture.xml:2370
3008 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
3009 #: freeculture.xml:2325
3010 msgid "Telephone interview with David Winer, 16 April 2003."
3013 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3014 #: freeculture.xml:2319
3016 "These conflicts become more important as media becomes more concentrated "
3017 "(more on this below). A concentrated media can hide more from the public "
3018 "than an unconcentrated media can—as CNN admitted it did after the Iraq "
3019 "war because it was afraid of the consequences to its own "
3020 "employees.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> It also needs to sustain "
3021 "a more coherent account. (In the middle of the Iraq war, I read a post on "
3022 "the Internet from someone who was at that time listening to a satellite "
3023 "uplink with a reporter in Iraq. The New York headquarters was telling the "
3024 "reporter over and over that her account of the war was too bleak: She needed "
3025 "to offer a more optimistic story. When she told New York that wasn't "
3026 "warranted, they told her <emphasis>that</emphasis> they were writing \"the "
3031 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
3032 #: freeculture.xml:2343
3034 "John Schwartz, \"Loss of the Shuttle: The Internet; A Wealth of Information "
3035 "Online,\" <citetitle>New York Times</citetitle>, 2 February 2003, A28; Staci "
3036 "D. Kramer, \"Shuttle Disaster Coverage Mixed, but Strong Overall,\" Online "
3037 "Journalism Review, 2 February 2003, available at <ulink "
3038 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #10</ulink>."
3041 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3042 #: freeculture.xml:2335
3044 "Blog space gives amateurs a way to enter the debate—\"amateur\" not in "
3045 "the sense of inexperienced, but in the sense of an Olympic athlete, meaning "
3046 "not paid by anyone to give their reports. It allows for a much broader range "
3047 "of input into a story, as reporting on the Columbia disaster revealed, when "
3048 "hundreds from across the southwest United States turned to the Internet to "
3049 "retell what they had seen.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> And it "
3050 "drives readers to read across the range of accounts and \"triangulate,\" as "
3051 "Winer puts it, the truth. Blogs, Winer says, are \"communicating directly "
3052 "with our constituency, and the middle man is out of it\"—with all the "
3053 "benefits, and costs, that might entail."
3056 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
3057 #: freeculture.xml:2362
3059 "See Michael Falcone, \"Does an Editor's Pencil Ruin a Web Log?\" "
3060 "<citetitle>New York Times</citetitle>, 29 September 2003, C4. (\"Not all "
3061 "news organizations have been as accepting of employees who blog. Kevin "
3062 "Sites, a CNN correspondent in Iraq who started a blog about his reporting of "
3063 "the war on March 9, stopped posting 12 days later at his bosses' "
3064 "request. Last year Steve Olafson, a <citetitle>Houston Chronicle</citetitle> "
3065 "reporter, was fired for keeping a personal Web log, published under a "
3066 "pseudonym, that dealt with some of the issues and people he was covering.\") "
3067 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
3071 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3072 #: freeculture.xml:2355
3074 "Winer is optimistic about the future of journalism infected with "
3075 "blogs. \"It's going to become an essential skill,\" Winer predicts, for "
3076 "public figures and increasingly for private figures as well. It's not clear "
3077 "that \"journalism\" is happy about this—some journalists have been "
3078 "told to curtail their blogging.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> But "
3079 "it is clear that we are still in transition. \"A lot of what we are doing "
3080 "now is warm-up exercises,\" Winer told me. There is a lot that must mature "
3081 "before this space has its mature effect. And as the inclusion of content in "
3082 "this space is the least infringing use of the Internet (meaning infringing "
3083 "on copyright), Winer said, \"we will be the last thing that gets shut "
3087 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3088 #: freeculture.xml:2382
3090 "This speech affects democracy. Winer thinks that happens because \"you don't "
3091 "have to work for somebody who controls, [for] a gatekeeper.\" That is "
3092 "true. But it affects democracy in another way as well. As more and more "
3093 "citizens express what they think, and defend it in writing, that will change "
3094 "the way people understand public issues. It is easy to be wrong and "
3095 "misguided in your head. It is harder when the product of your mind can be "
3096 "criticized by others. Of course, it is a rare human who admits that he has "
3097 "been persuaded that he is wrong. But it is even rarer for a human to ignore "
3098 "when he has been proven wrong. The writing of ideas, arguments, and "
3099 "criticism improves democracy. Today there are probably a couple of million "
3100 "blogs where such writing happens. When there are ten million, there will be "
3101 "something extraordinary to report."
3104 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
3105 #: freeculture.xml:2398
3106 msgid "Brown, John Seely"
3109 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3110 #: freeculture.xml:2401
3112 "John Seely Brown is the chief scientist of the Xerox Corporation. His work, "
3113 "as his Web site describes it, is \"human learning and . . . the creation of "
3114 "knowledge ecologies for creating . . . innovation.\""
3117 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3118 #: freeculture.xml:2406
3120 "Brown thus looks at these technologies of digital creativity a bit "
3121 "differently from the perspectives I've sketched so far. I'm sure he would be "
3122 "excited about any technology that might improve democracy. But his real "
3123 "excitement comes from how these technologies affect learning."
3127 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3128 #: freeculture.xml:2413
3130 "As Brown believes, we learn by tinkering. When \"a lot of us grew up,\" he "
3131 "explains, that tinkering was done \"on motorcycle engines, lawnmower "
3132 "engines, automobiles, radios, and so on.\" But digital technologies enable a "
3133 "different kind of tinkering—with abstract ideas though in concrete "
3134 "form. The kids at Just Think! not only think about how a commercial portrays "
3135 "a politician; using digital technology, they can take the commercial apart "
3136 "and manipulate it, tinker with it to see how it does what it does. Digital "
3137 "technologies launch a kind of bricolage, or \"free collage,\" as Brown calls "
3138 "it. Many get to add to or transform the tinkering of many others."
3141 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3142 #: freeculture.xml:2426
3144 "The best large-scale example of this kind of tinkering so far is free "
3145 "software or open-source software (FS/OSS). FS/OSS is software whose source "
3146 "code is shared. Anyone can download the technology that makes a FS/OSS "
3147 "program run. And anyone eager to learn how a particular bit of FS/OSS "
3148 "technology works can tinker with the code."
3151 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3152 #: freeculture.xml:2433
3154 "This opportunity creates a \"completely new kind of learning platform,\" as "
3155 "Brown describes. \"As soon as you start doing that, you . . . unleash a "
3156 "free collage on the community, so that other people can start looking at "
3157 "your code, tinkering with it, trying it out, seeing if they can improve "
3158 "it.\" Each effort is a kind of apprenticeship. \"Open source becomes a major "
3159 "apprenticeship platform.\""
3162 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3163 #: freeculture.xml:2441
3165 "In this process, \"the concrete things you tinker with are abstract. They "
3166 "are code.\" Kids are \"shifting to the ability to tinker in the abstract, "
3167 "and this tinkering is no longer an isolated activity that you're doing in "
3168 "your garage. You are tinkering with a community platform. . . . You are "
3169 "tinkering with other people's stuff. The more you tinker the more you "
3170 "improve.\" The more you improve, the more you learn."
3173 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3174 #: freeculture.xml:2450
3176 "This same thing happens with content, too. And it happens in the same "
3177 "collaborative way when that content is part of the Web. As Brown puts it, "
3178 "\"the Web [is] the first medium that truly honors multiple forms of "
3179 "intelligence.\" Earlier technologies, such as the typewriter or word "
3180 "processors, helped amplify text. But the Web amplifies much more than "
3181 "text. \"The Web . . . says if you are musical, if you are artistic, if you "
3182 "are visual, if you are interested in film . . . [then] there is a lot you "
3183 "can start to do on this medium. [It] can now amplify and honor these "
3184 "multiple forms of intelligence.\""
3188 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3189 #: freeculture.xml:2462
3191 "Brown is talking about what Elizabeth Daley, Stephanie Barish, and Just "
3192 "Think! teach: that this tinkering with culture teaches as well as "
3193 "creates. It develops talents differently, and it builds a different kind of "
3197 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3198 #: freeculture.xml:2470
3200 "Yet the freedom to tinker with these objects is not guaranteed. Indeed, as "
3201 "we'll see through the course of this book, that freedom is increasingly "
3202 "highly contested. While there's no doubt that your father had the right to "
3203 "tinker with the car engine, there's great doubt that your child will have "
3204 "the right to tinker with the images she finds all around. The law and, "
3205 "increasingly, technology interfere with a freedom that technology, and "
3206 "curiosity, would otherwise ensure."
3210 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
3211 #: freeculture.xml:2485
3213 "See, for example, Edward Felten and Andrew Appel, \"Technological Access "
3214 "Control Interferes with Noninfringing Scholarship,\" "
3215 "<citetitle>Communications of the Association for Computer "
3216 "Machinery</citetitle> 43 (2000): 9."
3219 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3220 #: freeculture.xml:2479
3222 "These restrictions have become the focus of researchers and scholars. "
3223 "Professor Ed Felten of Princeton (whom we'll see more of in chapter 10) has "
3224 "developed a powerful argument in favor of the \"right to tinker\" as it "
3225 "applies to computer science and to knowledge in general.<placeholder "
3226 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> But Brown's concern is earlier, or younger, or "
3227 "more fundamental. It is about the learning that kids can do, or can't do, "
3228 "because of the law."
3231 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3232 #: freeculture.xml:2493
3234 "\"This is where education in the twenty-first century is going,\" Brown "
3235 "explains. We need to \"understand how kids who grow up digital think and "
3239 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3240 #: freeculture.xml:2498
3242 "\"Yet,\" as Brown continued, and as the balance of this book will evince, "
3243 "\"we are building a legal system that completely suppresses the natural "
3244 "tendencies of today's digital kids. . . . We're building an architecture "
3245 "that unleashes 60 percent of the brain [and] a legal system that closes down "
3246 "that part of the brain.\""
3249 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3250 #: freeculture.xml:2506
3252 "We're building a technology that takes the magic of Kodak, mixes moving "
3253 "images and sound, and adds a space for commentary and an opportunity to "
3254 "spread that creativity everywhere. But we're building the law to close down "
3258 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3259 #: freeculture.xml:2512
3261 "\"No way to run a culture,\" as Brewster Kahle, whom we'll meet in chapter "
3262 "9, quipped to me in a rare moment of despondence."
3265 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
3266 #: freeculture.xml:2518
3267 msgid "CHAPTER THREE: Catalogs"
3270 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3271 #: freeculture.xml:2520
3273 "In the fall of 2002, Jesse Jordan of Oceanside, New York, enrolled as a "
3274 "freshman at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, in Troy, New York. His major "
3275 "at RPI was information technology. Though he is not a programmer, in October "
3276 "Jesse decided to begin to tinker with search engine technology that was "
3277 "available on the RPI network."
3280 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3281 #: freeculture.xml:2527
3283 "RPI is one of America's foremost technological research institutions. It "
3284 "offers degrees in fields ranging from architecture and engineering to "
3285 "information sciences. More than 65 percent of its five thousand "
3286 "undergraduates finished in the top 10 percent of their high school "
3287 "class. The school is thus a perfect mix of talent and experience to imagine "
3288 "and then build, a generation for the network age."
3291 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3292 #: freeculture.xml:2535
3294 "RPI's computer network links students, faculty, and administration to one "
3295 "another. It also links RPI to the Internet. Not everything available on the "
3296 "RPI network is available on the Internet. But the network is designed to "
3297 "enable students to get access to the Internet, as well as more intimate "
3298 "access to other members of the RPI community."
3302 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3303 #: freeculture.xml:2542
3305 "Search engines are a measure of a network's intimacy. Google brought the "
3306 "Internet much closer to all of us by fantastically improving the quality of "
3307 "search on the network. Specialty search engines can do this even better. The "
3308 "idea of \"intranet\" search engines, search engines that search within the "
3309 "network of a particular institution, is to provide users of that institution "
3310 "with better access to material from that institution. Businesses do this "
3311 "all the time, enabling employees to have access to material that people "
3312 "outside the business can't get. Universities do it as well."
3315 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3316 #: freeculture.xml:2554
3318 "These engines are enabled by the network technology itself. Microsoft, for "
3319 "example, has a network file system that makes it very easy for search "
3320 "engines tuned to that network to query the system for information about the "
3321 "publicly (within that network) available content. Jesse's search engine was "
3322 "built to take advantage of this technology. It used Microsoft's network file "
3323 "system to build an index of all the files available within the RPI network."
3326 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3327 #: freeculture.xml:2563
3329 "Jesse's wasn't the first search engine built for the RPI network. Indeed, "
3330 "his engine was a simple modification of engines that others had built. His "
3331 "single most important improvement over those engines was to fix a bug within "
3332 "the Microsoft file-sharing system that could cause a user's computer to "
3333 "crash. With the engines that existed before, if you tried to access a file "
3334 "through a Windows browser that was on a computer that was off-line, your "
3335 "computer could crash. Jesse modified the system a bit to fix that problem, "
3336 "by adding a button that a user could click to see if the machine holding the "
3337 "file was still on-line."
3340 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3341 #: freeculture.xml:2575
3343 "Jesse's engine went on-line in late October. Over the following six months, "
3344 "he continued to tweak it to improve its functionality. By March, the system "
3345 "was functioning quite well. Jesse had more than one million files in his "
3346 "directory, including every type of content that might be on users' "
3351 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3352 #: freeculture.xml:2582
3354 "Thus the index his search engine produced included pictures, which students "
3355 "could use to put on their own Web sites; copies of notes or research; copies "
3356 "of information pamphlets; movie clips that students might have created; "
3357 "university brochures—basically anything that users of the RPI network "
3358 "made available in a public folder of their computer."
3361 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3362 #: freeculture.xml:2591
3364 "But the index also included music files. In fact, one quarter of the files "
3365 "that Jesse's search engine listed were music files. But that means, of "
3366 "course, that three quarters were not, and—so that this point is "
3367 "absolutely clear—Jesse did nothing to induce people to put music files "
3368 "in their public folders. He did nothing to target the search engine to these "
3369 "files. He was a kid tinkering with a Google-like technology at a university "
3370 "where he was studying information science, and hence, tinkering was the "
3371 "aim. Unlike Google, or Microsoft, for that matter, he made no money from "
3372 "this tinkering; he was not connected to any business that would make any "
3373 "money from this experiment. He was a kid tinkering with technology in an "
3374 "environment where tinkering with technology was precisely what he was "
3378 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3379 #: freeculture.xml:2606
3381 "On April 3, 2003, Jesse was contacted by the dean of students at RPI. The "
3382 "dean informed Jesse that the Recording Industry Association of America, the "
3383 "RIAA, would be filing a lawsuit against him and three other students whom he "
3384 "didn't even know, two of them at other universities. A few hours later, "
3385 "Jesse was served with papers from the suit. As he read these papers and "
3386 "watched the news reports about them, he was increasingly astonished."
3389 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3390 #: freeculture.xml:2615
3392 "\"It was absurd,\" he told me. \"I don't think I did anything wrong. . . . "
3393 "I don't think there's anything wrong with the search engine that I ran or "
3394 ". . . what I had done to it. I mean, I hadn't modified it in any way that "
3395 "promoted or enhanced the work of pirates. I just modified the search engine "
3396 "in a way that would make it easier to use\"—again, a <emphasis>search "
3397 "engine</emphasis>, which Jesse had not himself built, using the Windows "
3398 "filesharing system, which Jesse had not himself built, to enable members of "
3399 "the RPI community to get access to content, which Jesse had not himself "
3400 "created or posted, and the vast majority of which had nothing to do with "
3405 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3406 #: freeculture.xml:2628
3408 "But the RIAA branded Jesse a pirate. They claimed he operated a network and "
3409 "had therefore \"willfully\" violated copyright laws. They demanded that he "
3410 "pay them the damages for his wrong. For cases of \"willful infringement,\" "
3411 "the Copyright Act specifies something lawyers call \"statutory damages.\" "
3412 "These damages permit a copyright owner to claim $150,000 per "
3413 "infringement. As the RIAA alleged more than one hundred specific copyright "
3414 "infringements, they therefore demanded that Jesse pay them at least "
3419 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
3420 #: freeculture.xml:2651
3422 "Tim Goral, \"Recording Industry Goes After Campus P-2-P Networks: Suit "
3423 "Alleges $97.8 Billion in Damages,\" <citetitle>Professional Media Group "
3424 "LCC</citetitle> 6 (2003): 5, available at 2003 WL 55179443."
3427 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3428 #: freeculture.xml:2639
3430 "Similar lawsuits were brought against three other students: one other "
3431 "student at RPI, one at Michigan Technical University, and one at "
3432 "Princeton. Their situations were similar to Jesse's. Though each case was "
3433 "different in detail, the bottom line in each was exactly the same: huge "
3434 "demands for \"damages\" that the RIAA claimed it was entitled to. If you "
3435 "added up the claims, these four lawsuits were asking courts in the United "
3436 "States to award the plaintiffs close to $100 "
3437 "<emphasis>billion</emphasis>—six times the <emphasis>total</emphasis> "
3438 "profit of the film industry in 2001.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
3442 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3443 #: freeculture.xml:2657
3445 "Jesse called his parents. They were supportive but a bit frightened. An "
3446 "uncle was a lawyer. He began negotiations with the RIAA. They demanded to "
3447 "know how much money Jesse had. Jesse had saved $12,000 from summer jobs and "
3448 "other employment. They demanded $12,000 to dismiss the case."
3451 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3452 #: freeculture.xml:2664
3454 "The RIAA wanted Jesse to admit to doing something wrong. He refused. They "
3455 "wanted him to agree to an injunction that would essentially make it "
3456 "impossible for him to work in many fields of technology for the rest of his "
3457 "life. He refused. They made him understand that this process of being sued "
3458 "was not going to be pleasant. (As Jesse's father recounted to me, the chief "
3459 "lawyer on the case, Matt Oppenheimer, told Jesse, \"You don't want to pay "
3460 "another visit to a dentist like me.\") And throughout, the RIAA insisted it "
3461 "would not settle the case until it took every penny Jesse had saved."
3465 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3466 #: freeculture.xml:2675
3468 "Jesse's family was outraged at these claims. They wanted to fight. But "
3469 "Jesse's uncle worked to educate the family about the nature of the American "
3470 "legal system. Jesse could fight the RIAA. He might even win. But the cost of "
3471 "fighting a lawsuit like this, Jesse was told, would be at least $250,000. If "
3472 "he won, he would not recover that money. If he won, he would have a piece of "
3473 "paper saying he had won, and a piece of paper saying he and his family were "
3477 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3478 #: freeculture.xml:2685
3480 "So Jesse faced a mafia-like choice: $250,000 and a chance at winning, or "
3481 "$12,000 and a settlement."
3485 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
3486 #: freeculture.xml:2697
3488 "Occupational Employment Survey, U.S. Dept. of Labor (2001) "
3489 "(27–2042—Musicians and Singers). See also National Endowment for "
3490 "the Arts, <citetitle>More Than One in a Blue Moon</citetitle> (2000)."
3494 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
3495 #: freeculture.xml:2705
3497 "Douglas Lichtman makes a related point in \"KaZaA and Punishment,\" "
3498 "<citetitle>Wall Street Journal</citetitle>, 10 September 2003, A24."
3501 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3502 #: freeculture.xml:2689
3504 "The recording industry insists this is a matter of law and morality. Let's "
3505 "put the law aside for a moment and think about the morality. Where is the "
3506 "morality in a lawsuit like this? What is the virtue in scapegoatism? The "
3507 "RIAA is an extraordinarily powerful lobby. The president of the RIAA is "
3508 "reported to make more than $1 million a year. Artists, on the other hand, "
3509 "are not well paid. The average recording artist makes $45,900.<placeholder "
3510 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> There are plenty of ways for the RIAA to affect "
3511 "and direct policy. So where is the morality in taking money from a student "
3512 "for running a search engine?<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/>"
3515 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3516 #: freeculture.xml:2710
3518 "On June 23, Jesse wired his savings to the lawyer working for the RIAA. The "
3519 "case against him was then dismissed. And with this, this kid who had "
3520 "tinkered a computer into a $15 million lawsuit became an activist:"
3523 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
3524 #: freeculture.xml:2717
3526 "I was definitely not an activist [before]. I never really meant to be an "
3527 "activist. . . . [But] I've been pushed into this. In no way did I ever "
3528 "foresee anything like this, but I think it's just completely absurd what the "
3532 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3533 #: freeculture.xml:2724
3535 "Jesse's parents betray a certain pride in their reluctant activist. As his "
3536 "father told me, Jesse \"considers himself very conservative, and so do "
3537 "I. . . . He's not a tree hugger. . . . I think it's bizarre that they would "
3538 "pick on him. But he wants to let people know that they're sending the wrong "
3539 "message. And he wants to correct the record.\""
3542 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
3543 #: freeculture.xml:2733
3544 msgid "CHAPTER FOUR: \"Pirates\""
3547 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
3548 #: freeculture.xml:2735
3550 "If \"piracy\" means using the creative property of others without their "
3551 "permission—if \"if value, then right\" is true—then the history "
3552 "of the content industry is a history of piracy. Every important sector of "
3553 "\"big media\" today—film, records, radio, and cable TV—was born "
3554 "of a kind of piracy so defined. The consistent story is how last "
3555 "generation's pirates join this generation's country club—until now."
3558 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
3559 #: freeculture.xml:2743
3563 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
3564 #: freeculture.xml:2747
3566 "I am grateful to Peter DiMauro for pointing me to this extraordinary "
3567 "history. See also Siva Vaidhyanathan, <citetitle>Copyrights and "
3568 "Copywrongs</citetitle>, 87–93, which details Edison's \"adventures\" "
3569 "with copyright and patent. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
3573 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3574 #: freeculture.xml:2745
3576 "The film industry of Hollywood was built by fleeing pirates.<placeholder "
3577 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Creators and directors migrated from the East "
3578 "Coast to California in the early twentieth century in part to escape "
3579 "controls that patents granted the inventor of filmmaking, Thomas "
3580 "Edison. These controls were exercised through a monopoly \"trust,\" the "
3581 "Motion Pictures Patents Company, and were based on Thomas Edison's creative "
3582 "property—patents. Edison formed the MPPC to exercise the rights this "
3583 "creative property gave him, and the MPPC was serious about the control it "
3587 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3588 #: freeculture.xml:2763
3589 msgid "As one commentator tells one part of the story,"
3592 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
3593 #: freeculture.xml:2767
3595 "A January 1909 deadline was set for all companies to comply with the "
3596 "license. By February, unlicensed outlaws, who referred to themselves as "
3597 "independents protested the trust and carried on business without submitting "
3598 "to the Edison monopoly. In the summer of 1909 the independent movement was "
3599 "in full-swing, with producers and theater owners using illegal equipment and "
3600 "imported film stock to create their own underground market."
3604 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
3605 #: freeculture.xml:2787
3607 "J. A. Aberdeen, <citetitle>Hollywood Renegades: The Society of Independent "
3608 "Motion Picture Producers</citetitle> (Cobblestone Entertainment, 2000) and "
3609 "expanded texts posted at \"The Edison Movie Monopoly: The Motion Picture "
3610 "Patents Company vs. the Independent Outlaws,\" available at <ulink "
3611 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #11</ulink>. For a discussion of "
3612 "the economic motive behind both these limits and the limits imposed by "
3613 "Victor on phonographs, see Randal C. Picker, \"From Edison to the Broadcast "
3614 "Flag: Mechanisms of Consent and Refusal and the Propertization of "
3615 "Copyright\" (September 2002), University of Chicago Law School, James "
3616 "M. Olin Program in Law and Economics, Working Paper No. 159."
3619 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><indexterm><primary>
3620 #: freeculture.xml:2798
3621 msgid "General Film Company"
3624 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
3625 #: freeculture.xml:2799 freeculture.xml:3044 freeculture.xml:4138 freeculture.xml:9471
3626 msgid "Picker, Randal C."
3629 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
3630 #: freeculture.xml:2776
3632 "With the country experiencing a tremendous expansion in the number of "
3633 "nickelodeons, the Patents Company reacted to the independent movement by "
3634 "forming a strong-arm subsidiary known as the General Film Company to block "
3635 "the entry of non-licensed independents. With coercive tactics that have "
3636 "become legendary, General Film confiscated unlicensed equipment, "
3637 "discontinued product supply to theaters which showed unlicensed films, and "
3638 "effectively monopolized distribution with the acquisition of all U.S. film "
3639 "exchanges, except for the one owned by the independent William Fox who "
3640 "defied the Trust even after his license was revoked.<placeholder "
3641 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/> "
3642 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"2\"/>"
3646 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
3647 #: freeculture.xml:2809
3649 "Marc Wanamaker, \"The First Studios,\" <citetitle>The Silents "
3650 "Majority</citetitle>, archived at <ulink "
3651 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #12</ulink>."
3654 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3655 #: freeculture.xml:2803
3657 "The Napsters of those days, the \"independents,\" were companies like "
3658 "Fox. And no less than today, these independents were vigorously resisted. "
3659 "\"Shooting was disrupted by machinery stolen, and `accidents' resulting in "
3660 "loss of negatives, equipment, buildings and sometimes life and limb "
3661 "frequently occurred.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> That led the "
3662 "independents to flee the East Coast. California was remote enough from "
3663 "Edison's reach that filmmakers there could pirate his inventions without "
3664 "fear of the law. And the leaders of Hollywood filmmaking, Fox most "
3665 "prominently, did just that."
3669 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3670 #: freeculture.xml:2819
3672 "Of course, California grew quickly, and the effective enforcement of federal "
3673 "law eventually spread west. But because patents grant the patent holder a "
3674 "truly \"limited\" monopoly (just seventeen years at that time), by the time "
3675 "enough federal marshals appeared, the patents had expired. A new industry "
3676 "had been born, in part from the piracy of Edison's creative property."
3679 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
3680 #: freeculture.xml:2830
3681 msgid "Recorded Music"
3684 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3685 #: freeculture.xml:2832
3687 "The record industry was born of another kind of piracy, though to see how "
3688 "requires a bit of detail about the way the law regulates music."
3691 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3692 #: freeculture.xml:2836
3694 "At the time that Edison and Henri Fourneaux invented machines for "
3695 "reproducing music (Edison the phonograph, Fourneaux the player piano), the "
3696 "law gave composers the exclusive right to control copies of their music and "
3697 "the exclusive right to control public performances of their music. In other "
3698 "words, in 1900, if I wanted a copy of Phil Russel's 1899 hit \"Happy Mose,\" "
3699 "the law said I would have to pay for the right to get a copy of the musical "
3700 "score, and I would also have to pay for the right to perform it publicly."
3703 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
3704 #: freeculture.xml:2845 freeculture.xml:2989
3708 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3709 #: freeculture.xml:2847
3711 "But what if I wanted to record \"Happy Mose,\" using Edison's phonograph or "
3712 "Fourneaux's player piano? Here the law stumbled. It was clear enough that I "
3713 "would have to buy any copy of the musical score that I performed in making "
3714 "this recording. And it was clear enough that I would have to pay for any "
3715 "public performance of the work I was recording. But it wasn't totally clear "
3716 "that I would have to pay for a \"public performance\" if I recorded the song "
3717 "in my own house (even today, you don't owe the Beatles anything if you sing "
3718 "their songs in the shower), or if I recorded the song from memory (copies in "
3719 "your brain are not—yet— regulated by copyright law). So if I "
3720 "simply sang the song into a recording device in the privacy of my own home, "
3721 "it wasn't clear that I owed the composer anything. And more importantly, it "
3722 "wasn't clear whether I owed the composer anything if I then made copies of "
3723 "those recordings. Because of this gap in the law, then, I could effectively "
3724 "pirate someone else's song without paying its composer anything."
3728 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3729 #: freeculture.xml:2865
3731 "The composers (and publishers) were none too happy about this capacity to "
3732 "pirate. As South Dakota senator Alfred Kittredge put it,"
3736 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
3737 #: freeculture.xml:2879
3739 "To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright: Hearings on S. 6330 "
3740 "and H.R. 19853 Before the ( Joint) Committees on Patents, 59th Cong. 59, 1st "
3741 "sess. (1906) (statement of Senator Alfred B. Kittredge, of South Dakota, "
3742 "chairman), reprinted in <citetitle>Legislative History of the Copyright "
3743 "Act</citetitle>, E. Fulton Brylawski and Abe Goldman, eds. (South "
3744 "Hackensack, N.J.: Rothman Reprints, 1976)."
3747 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
3748 #: freeculture.xml:2872
3750 "Imagine the injustice of the thing. A composer writes a song or an opera. A "
3751 "publisher buys at great expense the rights to the same and copyrights "
3752 "it. Along come the phonographic companies and companies who cut music rolls "
3753 "and deliberately steal the work of the brain of the composer and publisher "
3754 "without any regard for [their] rights.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
3759 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
3760 #: freeculture.xml:2893
3762 "To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright, 223 (statement of "
3763 "Nathan Burkan, attorney for the Music Publishers Association)."
3767 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
3768 #: freeculture.xml:2899
3770 "To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright, 226 (statement of "
3771 "Nathan Burkan, attorney for the Music Publishers Association)."
3775 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
3776 #: freeculture.xml:2906
3778 "To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright, 23 (statement of "
3779 "John Philip Sousa, composer)."
3782 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3783 #: freeculture.xml:2889
3785 "The innovators who developed the technology to record other people's works "
3786 "were \"sponging upon the toil, the work, the talent, and genius of American "
3787 "composers,\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> and the \"music "
3788 "publishing industry\" was thereby \"at the complete mercy of this one "
3789 "pirate.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> As John Philip Sousa put "
3790 "it, in as direct a way as possible, \"When they make money out of my pieces, "
3791 "I want a share of it.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"2\"/>"
3795 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
3796 #: freeculture.xml:2919
3798 "To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright, 283–84 "
3799 "(statement of Albert Walker, representative of the Auto-Music Perforating "
3800 "Company of New York)."
3804 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
3805 #: freeculture.xml:2930
3807 "To Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright, 376 (prepared "
3808 "memorandum of Philip Mauro, general patent counsel of the American "
3809 "Graphophone Company Association)."
3812 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3813 #: freeculture.xml:2911
3815 "These arguments have familiar echoes in the wars of our day. So, too, do the "
3816 "arguments on the other side. The innovators who developed the player piano "
3817 "argued that \"it is perfectly demonstrable that the introduction of "
3818 "automatic music players has not deprived any composer of anything he had "
3819 "before their introduction.\" Rather, the machines increased the sales of "
3820 "sheet music.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> In any case, the "
3821 "innovators argued, the job of Congress was \"to consider first the interest "
3822 "of [the public], whom they represent, and whose servants they are.\" \"All "
3823 "talk about `theft,'\" the general counsel of the American Graphophone "
3824 "Company wrote, \"is the merest claptrap, for there exists no property in "
3825 "ideas musical, literary or artistic, except as defined by "
3826 "statute.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/>"
3830 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3831 #: freeculture.xml:2936
3833 "The law soon resolved this battle in favor of the composer "
3834 "<emphasis>and</emphasis> the recording artist. Congress amended the law to "
3835 "make sure that composers would be paid for the \"mechanical reproductions\" "
3836 "of their music. But rather than simply granting the composer complete "
3837 "control over the right to make mechanical reproductions, Congress gave "
3838 "recording artists a right to record the music, at a price set by Congress, "
3839 "once the composer allowed it to be recorded once. This is the part of "
3840 "copyright law that makes cover songs possible. Once a composer authorizes a "
3841 "recording of his song, others are free to record the same song, so long as "
3842 "they pay the original composer a fee set by the law."
3845 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3846 #: freeculture.xml:2951
3848 "American law ordinarily calls this a \"compulsory license,\" but I will "
3849 "refer to it as a \"statutory license.\" A statutory license is a license "
3850 "whose key terms are set by law. After Congress's amendment of the Copyright "
3851 "Act in 1909, record companies were free to distribute copies of recordings "
3852 "so long as they paid the composer (or copyright holder) the fee set by the "
3856 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><indexterm><primary>
3857 #: freeculture.xml:2966 freeculture.xml:13735
3858 msgid "Grisham, John"
3861 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3862 #: freeculture.xml:2959
3864 "This is an exception within the law of copyright. When John Grisham writes a "
3865 "novel, a publisher is free to publish that novel only if Grisham gives the "
3866 "publisher permission. Grisham, in turn, is free to charge whatever he wants "
3867 "for that permission. The price to publish Grisham is thus set by Grisham, "
3868 "and copyright law ordinarily says you have no permission to use Grisham's "
3869 "work except with permission of Grisham. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
3874 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
3875 #: freeculture.xml:2983
3877 "Copyright Law Revision: Hearings on S. 2499, S. 2900, H.R. 243, and "
3878 "H.R. 11794 Before the ( Joint) Committee on Patents, 60th Cong., 1st sess., "
3879 "217 (1908) (statement of Senator Reed Smoot, chairman), reprinted in "
3880 "<citetitle>Legislative History of the 1909 Copyright Act</citetitle>, "
3881 "E. Fulton Brylawski and Abe Goldman, eds. (South Hackensack, N.J.: Rothman "
3885 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3886 #: freeculture.xml:2969
3888 "But the law governing recordings gives recording artists less. And thus, in "
3889 "effect, the law <emphasis>subsidizes</emphasis> the recording industry "
3890 "through a kind of piracy—by giving recording artists a weaker right "
3891 "than it otherwise gives creative authors. The Beatles have less control over "
3892 "their creative work than Grisham does. And the beneficiaries of this less "
3893 "control are the recording industry and the public. The recording industry "
3894 "gets something of value for less than it otherwise would pay; the public "
3895 "gets access to a much wider range of musical creativity. Indeed, Congress "
3896 "was quite explicit about its reasons for granting this right. Its fear was "
3897 "the monopoly power of rights holders, and that that power would stifle "
3898 "follow-on creativity.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder "
3899 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
3902 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3903 #: freeculture.xml:2992
3905 "While the recording industry has been quite coy about this recently, "
3906 "historically it has been quite a supporter of the statutory license for "
3907 "records. As a 1967 report from the House Committee on the Judiciary relates,"
3911 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
3912 #: freeculture.xml:3014
3914 "Copyright Law Revision: Report to Accompany H.R. 2512, House Committee on "
3915 "the Judiciary, 90th Cong., 1st sess., House Document no. 83, (8 March "
3916 "1967). I am grateful to Glenn Brown for drawing my attention to this report."
3919 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
3920 #: freeculture.xml:2999
3922 "the record producers argued vigorously that the compulsory license system "
3923 "must be retained. They asserted that the record industry is a "
3924 "half-billion-dollar business of great economic importance in the United "
3925 "States and throughout the world; records today are the principal means of "
3926 "disseminating music, and this creates special problems, since performers "
3927 "need unhampered access to musical material on nondiscriminatory "
3928 "terms. Historically, the record producers pointed out, there were no "
3929 "recording rights before 1909 and the 1909 statute adopted the compulsory "
3930 "license as a deliberate anti-monopoly condition on the grant of these "
3931 "rights. They argue that the result has been an outpouring of recorded music, "
3932 "with the public being given lower prices, improved quality, and a greater "
3933 "choice.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
3936 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3937 #: freeculture.xml:3021
3939 "By limiting the rights musicians have, by partially pirating their creative "
3940 "work, the record producers, and the public, benefit."
3943 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
3944 #: freeculture.xml:3026 freeculture.xml:4103
3948 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3949 #: freeculture.xml:3028
3950 msgid "Radio was also born of piracy."
3953 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
3954 #: freeculture.xml:3043
3955 msgid "Hand, Learned"
3958 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
3959 #: freeculture.xml:3034
3961 "See 17 <citetitle>United States Code</citetitle>, sections 106 and 110. At "
3962 "the beginning, record companies printed \"Not Licensed for Radio Broadcast\" "
3963 "and other messages purporting to restrict the ability to play a record on a "
3964 "radio station. Judge Learned Hand rejected the argument that a warning "
3965 "attached to a record might restrict the rights of the radio station. See "
3966 "<citetitle>RCA Manufacturing "
3967 "Co</citetitle>. v. <citetitle>Whiteman</citetitle>, 114 F. 2d 86 (2nd "
3968 "Cir. 1940). See also Randal C. Picker, \"From Edison to the Broadcast Flag: "
3969 "Mechanisms of Consent and Refusal and the Propertization of Copyright,\" "
3970 "<citetitle>University of Chicago Law Review</citetitle> 70 (2003): 281. "
3971 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
3975 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3976 #: freeculture.xml:3031
3978 "When a radio station plays a record on the air, that constitutes a \"public "
3979 "performance\" of the composer's work.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
3980 "id=\"0\"/> As I described above, the law gives the composer (or copyright "
3981 "holder) an exclusive right to public performances of his work. The radio "
3982 "station thus owes the composer money for that performance."
3985 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
3986 #: freeculture.xml:3061 freeculture.xml:8569 freeculture.xml:9025 freeculture.xml:11919
3987 msgid "Lovett, Lyle"
3991 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
3992 #: freeculture.xml:3051
3994 "But when the radio station plays a record, it is not only performing a copy "
3995 "of the <emphasis>composer's</emphasis> work. The radio station is also "
3996 "performing a copy of the <emphasis>recording artist's</emphasis> work. It's "
3997 "one thing to have \"Happy Birthday\" sung on the radio by the local "
3998 "children's choir; it's quite another to have it sung by the Rolling Stones "
3999 "or Lyle Lovett. The recording artist is adding to the value of the "
4000 "composition performed on the radio station. And if the law were perfectly "
4001 "consistent, the radio station would have to pay the recording artist for his "
4002 "work, just as it pays the composer of the music for his work. <placeholder "
4003 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
4006 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4007 #: freeculture.xml:3066
4009 "But it doesn't. Under the law governing radio performances, the radio "
4010 "station does not have to pay the recording artist. The radio station need "
4011 "only pay the composer. The radio station thus gets a bit of something for "
4012 "nothing. It gets to perform the recording artist's work for free, even if it "
4013 "must pay the composer something for the privilege of playing the song."
4016 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
4017 #: freeculture.xml:3074 freeculture.xml:3566 freeculture.xml:5943
4021 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4022 #: freeculture.xml:3077
4024 "This difference can be huge. Imagine you compose a piece of music. Imagine "
4025 "it is your first. You own the exclusive right to authorize public "
4026 "performances of that music. So if Madonna wants to sing your song in public, "
4027 "she has to get your permission."
4030 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4031 #: freeculture.xml:3083
4033 "Imagine she does sing your song, and imagine she likes it a lot. She then "
4034 "decides to make a recording of your song, and it becomes a top hit. Under "
4035 "our law, every time a radio station plays your song, you get some money. But "
4036 "Madonna gets nothing, save the indirect effect on the sale of her CDs. The "
4037 "public performance of her recording is not a \"protected\" right. The radio "
4038 "station thus gets to <emphasis>pirate</emphasis> the value of Madonna's work "
4039 "without paying her anything."
4042 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4043 #: freeculture.xml:3094
4045 "No doubt, one might argue that, on balance, the recording artists "
4046 "benefit. On average, the promotion they get is worth more than the "
4047 "performance rights they give up. Maybe. But even if so, the law ordinarily "
4048 "gives the creator the right to make this choice. By making the choice for "
4049 "him or her, the law gives the radio station the right to take something for "
4053 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
4054 #: freeculture.xml:3103 freeculture.xml:4109
4058 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4059 #: freeculture.xml:3106
4060 msgid "Cable TV was also born of a kind of piracy."
4064 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4065 #: freeculture.xml:3109
4067 "When cable entrepreneurs first started wiring communities with cable "
4068 "television in 1948, most refused to pay broadcasters for the content that "
4069 "they echoed to their customers. Even when the cable companies started "
4070 "selling access to television broadcasts, they refused to pay for what they "
4071 "sold. Cable companies were thus Napsterizing broadcasters' content, but more "
4072 "egregiously than anything Napster ever did— Napster never charged for "
4073 "the content it enabled others to give away."
4076 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
4077 #: freeculture.xml:3119
4078 msgid "Anello, Douglas"
4081 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
4082 #: freeculture.xml:3120
4083 msgid "Burdick, Quentin"
4087 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4088 #: freeculture.xml:3126
4090 "Copyright Law Revision—CATV: Hearing on S. 1006 Before the "
4091 "Subcommittee on Patents, Trademarks, and Copyrights of the Senate Committee "
4092 "on the Judiciary, 89th Cong., 2nd sess., 78 (1966) (statement of Rosel "
4093 "H. Hyde, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission)."
4097 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4098 #: freeculture.xml:3137
4100 "Copyright Law Revision—CATV, 116 (statement of Douglas A. Anello, "
4101 "general counsel of the National Association of Broadcasters)."
4104 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4105 #: freeculture.xml:3122
4107 "Broadcasters and copyright owners were quick to attack this theft. Rosel "
4108 "Hyde, chairman of the FCC, viewed the practice as a kind of \"unfair and "
4109 "potentially destructive competition.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
4110 "id=\"0\"/> There may have been a \"public interest\" in spreading the reach "
4111 "of cable TV, but as Douglas Anello, general counsel to the National "
4112 "Association of Broadcasters, asked Senator Quentin Burdick during testimony, "
4113 "\"Does public interest dictate that you use somebody else's "
4114 "property?\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> As another broadcaster "
4119 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
4120 #: freeculture.xml:3148
4122 "Copyright Law Revision—CATV, 126 (statement of Ernest W. Jennes, "
4123 "general counsel of the Association of Maximum Service Telecasters, Inc.)."
4126 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
4127 #: freeculture.xml:3144
4129 "The extraordinary thing about the CATV business is that it is the only "
4130 "business I know of where the product that is being sold is not paid "
4131 "for.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
4134 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4135 #: freeculture.xml:3154
4136 msgid "Again, the demand of the copyright holders seemed reasonable enough:"
4140 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
4141 #: freeculture.xml:3163
4143 "Copyright Law Revision—CATV, 169 (joint statement of Arthur B. Krim, "
4144 "president of United Artists Corp., and John Sinn, president of United "
4145 "Artists Television, Inc.)."
4148 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
4149 #: freeculture.xml:3158
4151 "All we are asking for is a very simple thing, that people who now take our "
4152 "property for nothing pay for it. We are trying to stop piracy and I don't "
4153 "think there is any lesser word to describe it. I think there are harsher "
4154 "words which would fit it.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
4158 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4159 #: freeculture.xml:3174
4161 "Copyright Law Revision—CATV, 209 (statement of Charlton Heston, "
4162 "president of the Screen Actors Guild)."
4165 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4166 #: freeculture.xml:3170
4168 "These were \"free-ride[rs],\" Screen Actor's Guild president Charlton Heston "
4169 "said, who were \"depriving actors of compensation.\"<placeholder "
4170 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
4173 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4174 #: freeculture.xml:3179
4176 "But again, there was another side to the debate. As Assistant Attorney "
4177 "General Edwin Zimmerman put it,"
4180 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><indexterm><primary>
4181 #: freeculture.xml:3195 freeculture.xml:3197
4182 msgid "Zimmerman, Edwin"
4185 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
4186 #: freeculture.xml:3193
4188 "Copyright Law Revision—CATV, 216 (statement of Edwin M. Zimmerman, "
4189 "acting assistant attorney general). <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
4193 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
4194 #: freeculture.xml:3184
4196 "Our point here is that unlike the problem of whether you have any copyright "
4197 "protection at all, the problem here is whether copyright holders who are "
4198 "already compensated, who already have a monopoly, should be permitted to "
4199 "extend that monopoly. . . . The question here is how much compensation they "
4200 "should have and how far back they should carry their right to "
4201 "compensation.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder "
4202 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
4205 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4206 #: freeculture.xml:3201
4208 "Copyright owners took the cable companies to court. Twice the Supreme Court "
4209 "held that the cable companies owed the copyright owners nothing."
4212 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4213 #: freeculture.xml:3205
4215 "It took Congress almost thirty years before it resolved the question of "
4216 "whether cable companies had to pay for the content they \"pirated.\" In the "
4217 "end, Congress resolved this question in the same way that it resolved the "
4218 "question about record players and player pianos. Yes, cable companies would "
4219 "have to pay for the content that they broadcast; but the price they would "
4220 "have to pay was not set by the copyright owner. The price was set by law, "
4221 "so that the broadcasters couldn't exercise veto power over the emerging "
4222 "technologies of cable. Cable companies thus built their empire in part upon "
4223 "a \"piracy\" of the value created by broadcasters' content."
4227 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4228 #: freeculture.xml:3222
4230 "See, for example, National Music Publisher's Association, <citetitle>The "
4231 "Engine of Free Expression: Copyright on the Internet—The Myth of Free "
4232 "Information</citetitle>, available at <ulink "
4233 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #13</ulink>. \"The threat of "
4234 "piracy—the use of someone else's creative work without permission or "
4235 "compensation—has grown with the Internet.\""
4238 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4239 #: freeculture.xml:3217
4241 "These separate stories sing a common theme. If \"piracy\" means using value "
4242 "from someone else's creative property without permission from that "
4243 "creator—as it is increasingly described today<placeholder "
4244 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> — then <emphasis>every</emphasis> "
4245 "industry affected by copyright today is the product and beneficiary of a "
4246 "certain kind of piracy. Film, records, radio, cable TV. . . . The list is "
4247 "long and could well be expanded. Every generation welcomes the pirates from "
4248 "the last. Every generation—until now."
4251 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
4252 #: freeculture.xml:3239
4253 msgid "CHAPTER FIVE: \"Piracy\""
4256 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
4257 #: freeculture.xml:3241
4259 "There is piracy of copyrighted material. Lots of it. This piracy comes in "
4260 "many forms. The most significant is commercial piracy, the unauthorized "
4261 "taking of other people's content within a commercial context. Despite the "
4262 "many justifications that are offered in its defense, this taking is "
4263 "wrong. No one should condone it, and the law should stop it."
4267 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
4268 #: freeculture.xml:3249
4270 "But as well as copy-shop piracy, there is another kind of \"taking\" that is "
4271 "more directly related to the Internet. That taking, too, seems wrong to "
4272 "many, and it is wrong much of the time. Before we paint this taking "
4273 "\"piracy,\" however, we should understand its nature a bit more. For the "
4274 "harm of this taking is significantly more ambiguous than outright copying, "
4275 "and the law should account for that ambiguity, as it has so often done in "
4279 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
4280 #: freeculture.xml:3259
4285 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4286 #: freeculture.xml:3267
4288 "See IFPI (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry), "
4289 "<citetitle>The Recording Industry Commercial Piracy Report 2003</citetitle>, "
4290 "July 2003, available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
4291 "#14</ulink>. See also Ben Hunt, \"Companies Warned on Music Piracy Risk,\" "
4292 "<citetitle>Financial Times</citetitle>, 14 February 2003, 11."
4295 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4296 #: freeculture.xml:3261
4298 "All across the world, but especially in Asia and Eastern Europe, there are "
4299 "businesses that do nothing but take others people's copyrighted content, "
4300 "copy it, and sell it—all without the permission of a copyright "
4301 "owner. The recording industry estimates that it loses about $4.6 billion "
4302 "every year to physical piracy<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> (that "
4303 "works out to one in three CDs sold worldwide). The MPAA estimates that it "
4304 "loses $3 billion annually worldwide to piracy."
4307 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4308 #: freeculture.xml:3277
4310 "This is piracy plain and simple. Nothing in the argument of this book, nor "
4311 "in the argument that most people make when talking about the subject of this "
4312 "book, should draw into doubt this simple point: This piracy is wrong."
4315 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4316 #: freeculture.xml:3283
4318 "Which is not to say that excuses and justifications couldn't be made for "
4319 "it. We could, for example, remind ourselves that for the first one hundred "
4320 "years of the American Republic, America did not honor foreign copyrights. We "
4321 "were born, in this sense, a pirate nation. It might therefore seem "
4322 "hypocritical for us to insist so strongly that other developing nations "
4323 "treat as wrong what we, for the first hundred years of our existence, "
4327 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4328 #: freeculture.xml:3292
4330 "That excuse isn't terribly strong. Technically, our law did not ban the "
4331 "taking of foreign works. It explicitly limited itself to American "
4332 "works. Thus the American publishers who published foreign works without the "
4333 "permission of foreign authors were not violating any rule. The copy shops "
4334 "in Asia, by contrast, are violating Asian law. Asian law does protect "
4335 "foreign copyrights, and the actions of the copy shops violate that law. So "
4336 "the wrong of piracy that they engage in is not just a moral wrong, but a "
4337 "legal wrong, and not just an internationally legal wrong, but a locally "
4338 "legal wrong as well."
4342 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4343 #: freeculture.xml:3303
4345 "True, these local rules have, in effect, been imposed upon these "
4346 "countries. No country can be part of the world economy and choose not to "
4347 "protect copyright internationally. We may have been born a pirate nation, "
4348 "but we will not allow any other nation to have a similar childhood."
4351 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
4352 #: freeculture.xml:3330 freeculture.xml:12199 freeculture.xml:12626 freeculture.xml:12633
4353 msgid "Drahos, Peter"
4356 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4357 #: freeculture.xml:3316
4359 "See Peter Drahos with John Braithwaite, Information Feudalism: "
4360 "<citetitle>Who Owns the Knowledge Economy?</citetitle> (New York: The New "
4361 "Press, 2003), 10–13, 209. The Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual "
4362 "Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement obligates member nations to create "
4363 "administrative and enforcement mechanisms for intellectual property rights, "
4364 "a costly proposition for developing countries. Additionally, patent rights "
4365 "may lead to higher prices for staple industries such as agriculture. Critics "
4366 "of TRIPS question the disparity between burdens imposed upon developing "
4367 "countries and benefits conferred to industrialized nations. TRIPS does "
4368 "permit governments to use patents for public, noncommercial uses without "
4369 "first obtaining the patent holder's permission. Developing nations may be "
4370 "able to use this to gain the benefits of foreign patents at lower "
4371 "prices. This is a promising strategy for developing nations within the TRIPS "
4372 "framework. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
4375 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4376 #: freeculture.xml:3311
4378 "If a country is to be treated as a sovereign, however, then its laws are its "
4379 "laws regardless of their source. The international law under which these "
4380 "nations live gives them some opportunities to escape the burden of "
4381 "intellectual property law.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> In my "
4382 "view, more developing nations should take advantage of that opportunity, but "
4383 "when they don't, then their laws should be respected. And under the laws of "
4384 "these nations, this piracy is wrong."
4387 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
4388 #: freeculture.xml:3350 freeculture.xml:3613 freeculture.xml:14262
4389 msgid "Liebowitz, Stan"
4392 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4393 #: freeculture.xml:3343
4395 "For an analysis of the economic impact of copying technology, see Stan "
4396 "Liebowitz, <citetitle>Rethinking the Network Economy</citetitle> (New York: "
4397 "Amacom, 2002), 144–90. \"In some instances . . . the impact of piracy "
4398 "on the copyright holder's ability to appropriate the value of the work will "
4399 "be negligible. One obvious instance is the case where the individual "
4400 "engaging in pirating would not have purchased an original even if pirating "
4401 "were not an option.\" Ibid., 149. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
4405 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4406 #: freeculture.xml:3337
4408 "Alternatively, we could try to excuse this piracy by noting that in any "
4409 "case, it does no harm to the industry. The Chinese who get access to "
4410 "American CDs at 50 cents a copy are not people who would have bought those "
4411 "American CDs at $15 a copy. So no one really has any less money than they "
4412 "otherwise would have had.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
4415 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4416 #: freeculture.xml:3354
4418 "This is often true (though I have friends who have purchased many thousands "
4419 "of pirated DVDs who certainly have enough money to pay for the content they "
4420 "have taken), and it does mitigate to some degree the harm caused by such "
4421 "taking. Extremists in this debate love to say, \"You wouldn't go into Barnes "
4422 "& Noble and take a book off of the shelf without paying; why should it "
4423 "be any different with on-line music?\" The difference is, of course, that "
4424 "when you take a book from Barnes & Noble, it has one less book to "
4425 "sell. By contrast, when you take an MP3 from a computer network, there is "
4426 "not one less CD that can be sold. The physics of piracy of the intangible "
4427 "are different from the physics of piracy of the tangible."
4431 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4432 #: freeculture.xml:3367
4434 "This argument is still very weak. However, although copyright is a property "
4435 "right of a very special sort, it <emphasis>is</emphasis> a property "
4436 "right. Like all property rights, the copyright gives the owner the right to "
4437 "decide the terms under which content is shared. If the copyright owner "
4438 "doesn't want to sell, she doesn't have to. There are exceptions: important "
4439 "statutory licenses that apply to copyrighted content regardless of the wish "
4440 "of the copyright owner. Those licenses give people the right to \"take\" "
4441 "copyrighted content whether or not the copyright owner wants to sell. But "
4442 "where the law does not give people the right to take content, it is wrong to "
4443 "take that content even if the wrong does no harm. If we have a property "
4444 "system, and that system is properly balanced to the technology of a time, "
4445 "then it is wrong to take property without the permission of a property "
4446 "owner. That is exactly what \"property\" means."
4449 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><indexterm><primary>
4450 #: freeculture.xml:3396 freeculture.xml:3423 freeculture.xml:11060 freeculture.xml:12509 freeculture.xml:13059
4451 msgid "Linux operating system"
4454 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
4455 #: freeculture.xml:3398
4459 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><secondary>
4460 #: freeculture.xml:3399
4461 msgid "Windows operating system of"
4464 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
4465 #: freeculture.xml:3401
4469 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4470 #: freeculture.xml:3385
4472 "Finally, we could try to excuse this piracy with the argument that the "
4473 "piracy actually helps the copyright owner. When the Chinese \"steal\" "
4474 "Windows, that makes the Chinese dependent on Microsoft. Microsoft loses the "
4475 "value of the software that was taken. But it gains users who are used to "
4476 "life in the Microsoft world. Over time, as the nation grows more wealthy, "
4477 "more and more people will buy software rather than steal it. And hence over "
4478 "time, because that buying will benefit Microsoft, Microsoft benefits from "
4479 "the piracy. If instead of pirating Microsoft Windows, the Chinese used the "
4480 "free GNU/Linux operating system, then these Chinese users would not "
4481 "eventually be buying Microsoft. Without piracy, then, Microsoft would "
4482 "lose. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder "
4483 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"2\"/>"
4486 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4487 #: freeculture.xml:3404
4489 "This argument, too, is somewhat true. The addiction strategy is a good "
4490 "one. Many businesses practice it. Some thrive because of it. Law students, "
4491 "for example, are given free access to the two largest legal databases. The "
4492 "companies marketing both hope the students will become so used to their "
4493 "service that they will want to use it and not the other when they become "
4494 "lawyers (and must pay high subscription fees)."
4497 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4498 #: freeculture.xml:3412
4500 "Still, the argument is not terribly persuasive. We don't give the alcoholic "
4501 "a defense when he steals his first beer, merely because that will make it "
4502 "more likely that he will buy the next three. Instead, we ordinarily allow "
4503 "businesses to decide for themselves when it is best to give their product "
4504 "away. If Microsoft fears the competition of GNU/Linux, then Microsoft can "
4505 "give its product away, as it did, for example, with Internet Explorer to "
4506 "fight Netscape. A property right means giving the property owner the right "
4507 "to say who gets access to what—at least ordinarily. And if the law "
4508 "properly balances the rights of the copyright owner with the rights of "
4509 "access, then violating the law is still wrong. <placeholder "
4510 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
4514 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4515 #: freeculture.xml:3427
4517 "Thus, while I understand the pull of these justifications for piracy, and I "
4518 "certainly see the motivation, in my view, in the end, these efforts at "
4519 "justifying commercial piracy simply don't cut it. This kind of piracy is "
4520 "rampant and just plain wrong. It doesn't transform the content it steals; it "
4521 "doesn't transform the market it competes in. It merely gives someone access "
4522 "to something that the law says he should not have. Nothing has changed to "
4523 "draw that law into doubt. This form of piracy is flat out wrong."
4526 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4527 #: freeculture.xml:3437
4529 "But as the examples from the four chapters that introduced this part "
4530 "suggest, even if some piracy is plainly wrong, not all \"piracy\" is. Or at "
4531 "least, not all \"piracy\" is wrong if that term is understood in the way it "
4532 "is increasingly used today. Many kinds of \"piracy\" are useful and "
4533 "productive, to produce either new content or new ways of doing business. "
4534 "Neither our tradition nor any tradition has ever banned all \"piracy\" in "
4535 "that sense of the term."
4538 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4539 #: freeculture.xml:3446
4541 "This doesn't mean that there are no questions raised by the latest piracy "
4542 "concern, peer-to-peer file sharing. But it does mean that we need to "
4543 "understand the harm in peer-to-peer sharing a bit more before we condemn it "
4544 "to the gallows with the charge of piracy."
4547 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4548 #: freeculture.xml:3452
4550 "For (1) like the original Hollywood, p2p sharing escapes an overly "
4551 "controlling industry; and (2) like the original recording industry, it "
4552 "simply exploits a new way to distribute content; but (3) unlike cable TV, no "
4553 "one is selling the content that is shared on p2p services."
4556 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4557 #: freeculture.xml:3458
4559 "These differences distinguish p2p sharing from true piracy. They should push "
4560 "us to find a way to protect artists while enabling this sharing to survive."
4563 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
4564 #: freeculture.xml:3464
4569 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4570 #: freeculture.xml:3469
4572 "<citetitle>Bach</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Longman</citetitle>, 98 "
4573 "Eng. Rep. 1274 (1777)."
4577 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4578 #: freeculture.xml:3466
4580 "The key to the \"piracy\" that the law aims to quash is a use that \"rob[s] "
4581 "the author of [his] profit.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> This "
4582 "means we must determine whether and how much p2p sharing harms before we "
4583 "know how strongly the law should seek to either prevent it or find an "
4584 "alternative to assure the author of his profit."
4587 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
4588 #: freeculture.xml:3492 freeculture.xml:8002
4589 msgid "Christensen, Clayton M."
4592 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4593 #: freeculture.xml:3483
4595 "See Clayton M. Christensen, <citetitle>The Innovator's Dilemma: The "
4596 "Revolutionary National Bestseller That Changed the Way We Do "
4597 "Business</citetitle> (New York: HarperBusiness, 2000). Professor Christensen "
4598 "examines why companies that give rise to and dominate a product area are "
4599 "frequently unable to come up with the most creative, paradigm-shifting uses "
4600 "for their own products. This job usually falls to outside innovators, who "
4601 "reassemble existing technology in inventive ways. For a discussion of "
4602 "Christensen's ideas, see Lawrence Lessig, <citetitle>Future</citetitle>, "
4603 "89–92, 139. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
4606 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
4607 #: freeculture.xml:3495
4608 msgid "Fanning, Shawn"
4611 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4612 #: freeculture.xml:3478
4614 "Peer-to-peer sharing was made famous by Napster. But the inventors of the "
4615 "Napster technology had not made any major technological innovations. Like "
4616 "every great advance in innovation on the Internet (and, arguably, off the "
4617 "Internet as well<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>), Shawn Fanning "
4618 "and crew had simply put together components that had been developed "
4619 "independently. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
4623 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4624 #: freeculture.xml:3503
4626 "See Carolyn Lochhead, \"Silicon Valley Dream, Hollywood Nightmare,\" "
4627 "<citetitle>San Francisco Chronicle</citetitle>, 24 September 2002, A1; "
4628 "\"Rock 'n' Roll Suicide,\" <citetitle>New Scientist</citetitle>, 6 July "
4629 "2002, 42; Benny Evangelista, \"Napster Names CEO, Secures New Financing,\" "
4630 "<citetitle>San Francisco Chronicle</citetitle>, 23 May 2003, C1; \"Napster's "
4631 "Wake-Up Call,\" <citetitle>Economist</citetitle>, 24 June 2000, 23; John "
4632 "Naughton, \"Hollywood at War with the Internet\" (London) "
4633 "<citetitle>Times</citetitle>, 26 July 2002, 18."
4636 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4637 #: freeculture.xml:3498
4639 "The result was spontaneous combustion. Launched in July 1999, Napster "
4640 "amassed over 10 million users within nine months. After eighteen months, "
4641 "there were close to 80 million registered users of the system.<placeholder "
4642 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Courts quickly shut Napster down, but other "
4643 "services emerged to take its place. (Kazaa is currently the most popular p2p "
4644 "service. It boasts over 100 million members.) These services' systems are "
4645 "different architecturally, though not very different in function: Each "
4646 "enables users to make content available to any number of other users. With a "
4647 "p2p system, you can share your favorite songs with your best friend— "
4648 "or your 20,000 best friends."
4652 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4653 #: freeculture.xml:3525
4655 "See Ipsos-Insight, <citetitle>TEMPO: Keeping Pace with Online Music "
4656 "Distribution</citetitle> (September 2002), reporting that 28 percent of "
4657 "Americans aged twelve and older have downloaded music off of the Internet "
4658 "and 30 percent have listened to digital music files stored on their "
4663 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4664 #: freeculture.xml:3534
4666 "Amy Harmon, \"Industry Offers a Carrot in Online Music Fight,\" "
4667 "<citetitle>New York Times</citetitle>, 6 June 2003, A1."
4670 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4671 #: freeculture.xml:3519
4673 "According to a number of estimates, a huge proportion of Americans have "
4674 "tasted file-sharing technology. A study by Ipsos-Insight in September 2002 "
4675 "estimated that 60 million Americans had downloaded music—28 percent of "
4676 "Americans older than 12.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> A survey "
4677 "by the NPD group quoted in <citetitle>The New York Times</citetitle> "
4678 "estimated that 43 million citizens used file-sharing networks to exchange "
4679 "content in May 2003.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> The vast "
4680 "majority of these are not kids. Whatever the actual figure, a massive "
4681 "quantity of content is being \"taken\" on these networks. The ease and "
4682 "inexpensiveness of file-sharing networks have inspired millions to enjoy "
4683 "music in a way that they hadn't before."
4686 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4687 #: freeculture.xml:3543
4689 "Some of this enjoying involves copyright infringement. Some of it does "
4690 "not. And even among the part that is technically copyright infringement, "
4691 "calculating the actual harm to copyright owners is more complicated than one "
4692 "might think. So consider—a bit more carefully than the polarized "
4693 "voices around this debate usually do—the kinds of sharing that file "
4694 "sharing enables, and the kinds of harm it entails."
4698 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4699 #: freeculture.xml:3553
4701 "File sharers share different kinds of content. We can divide these different "
4702 "kinds into four types."
4705 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
4706 #: freeculture.xml:3559
4708 "There are some who use sharing networks as substitutes for purchasing "
4709 "content. Thus, when a new Madonna CD is released, rather than buying the CD, "
4710 "these users simply take it. We might quibble about whether everyone who "
4711 "takes it would actually have bought it if sharing didn't make it available "
4712 "for free. Most probably wouldn't have, but clearly there are some who "
4713 "would. The latter are the target of category A: users who download instead "
4714 "of purchasing. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
4718 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
4719 #: freeculture.xml:3570
4721 "There are some who use sharing networks to sample music before purchasing "
4722 "it. Thus, a friend sends another friend an MP3 of an artist he's not heard "
4723 "of. The other friend then buys CDs by that artist. This is a kind of "
4724 "targeted advertising, quite likely to succeed. If the friend recommending "
4725 "the album gains nothing from a bad recommendation, then one could expect "
4726 "that the recommendations will actually be quite good. The net effect of this "
4727 "sharing could increase the quantity of music purchased."
4731 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
4732 #: freeculture.xml:3581
4734 "There are many who use sharing networks to get access to copyrighted content "
4735 "that is no longer sold or that they would not have purchased because the "
4736 "transaction costs off the Net are too high. This use of sharing networks is "
4737 "among the most rewarding for many. Songs that were part of your childhood "
4738 "but have long vanished from the marketplace magically appear again on the "
4739 "network. (One friend told me that when she discovered Napster, she spent a "
4740 "solid weekend \"recalling\" old songs. She was astonished at the range and "
4741 "mix of content that was available.) For content not sold, this is still "
4742 "technically a violation of copyright, though because the copyright owner is "
4743 "not selling the content anymore, the economic harm is zero—the same "
4744 "harm that occurs when I sell my collection of 1960s 45-rpm records to a "
4750 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
4751 #: freeculture.xml:3598
4753 "Finally, there are many who use sharing networks to get access to content "
4754 "that is not copyrighted or that the copyright owner wants to give away."
4757 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4758 #: freeculture.xml:3604
4759 msgid "How do these different types of sharing balance out?"
4762 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4763 #: freeculture.xml:3612
4765 "See Liebowitz, <citetitle>Rethinking the Network Economy</citetitle>, "
4766 "148–49. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
4769 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4770 #: freeculture.xml:3607
4772 "Let's start with some simple but important points. From the perspective of "
4773 "the law, only type D sharing is clearly legal. From the perspective of "
4774 "economics, only type A sharing is clearly harmful.<placeholder "
4775 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Type B sharing is illegal but plainly "
4776 "beneficial. Type C sharing is illegal, yet good for society (since more "
4777 "exposure to music is good) and harmless to the artist (since the work is "
4778 "not otherwise available). So how sharing matters on balance is a hard "
4779 "question to answer—and certainly much more difficult than the current "
4780 "rhetoric around the issue suggests."
4783 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4784 #: freeculture.xml:3623
4786 "Whether on balance sharing is harmful depends importantly on how harmful "
4787 "type A sharing is. Just as Edison complained about Hollywood, composers "
4788 "complained about piano rolls, recording artists complained about radio, and "
4789 "broadcasters complained about cable TV, the music industry complains that "
4790 "type A sharing is a kind of \"theft\" that is \"devastating\" the industry."
4794 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4795 #: freeculture.xml:3638
4797 "See Cap Gemini Ernst & Young, <citetitle>Technology Evolution and the "
4798 "Music Industry's Business Model Crisis</citetitle> (2003), 3. This report "
4799 "describes the music industry's effort to stigmatize the budding practice of "
4800 "cassette taping in the 1970s, including an advertising campaign featuring a "
4801 "cassette-shape skull and the caption \"Home taping is killing music.\" At "
4802 "the time digital audio tape became a threat, the Office of Technical "
4803 "Assessment conducted a survey of consumer behavior. In 1988, 40 percent of "
4804 "consumers older than ten had taped music to a cassette format. U.S. "
4805 "Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, <citetitle>Copyright and Home "
4806 "Copying: Technology Challenges the Law</citetitle>, OTA-CIT-422 (Washington, "
4807 "D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, October 1989), 145–56."
4810 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4811 #: freeculture.xml:3631
4813 "While the numbers do suggest that sharing is harmful, how harmful is harder "
4814 "to reckon. It has long been the recording industry's practice to blame "
4815 "technology for any drop in sales. The history of cassette recording is a "
4816 "good example. As a study by Cap Gemini Ernst & Young put it, \"Rather "
4817 "than exploiting this new, popular technology, the labels fought "
4818 "it.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The labels claimed that every "
4819 "album taped was an album unsold, and when record sales fell by 11.4 percent "
4820 "in 1981, the industry claimed that its point was proved. Technology was the "
4821 "problem, and banning or regulating technology was the answer."
4825 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4826 #: freeculture.xml:3664
4827 msgid "U.S. Congress, <citetitle>Copyright and Home Copying</citetitle>, 4."
4830 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4831 #: freeculture.xml:3656
4833 "Yet soon thereafter, and before Congress was given an opportunity to enact "
4834 "regulation, MTV was launched, and the industry had a record turnaround. \"In "
4835 "the end,\" Cap Gemini concludes, \"the `crisis' . . . was not the fault of "
4836 "the tapers—who did not [stop after MTV came into being]—but had "
4837 "to a large extent resulted from stagnation in musical innovation at the "
4838 "major labels.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
4841 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4842 #: freeculture.xml:3668
4844 "But just because the industry was wrong before does not mean it is wrong "
4845 "today. To evaluate the real threat that p2p sharing presents to the industry "
4846 "in particular, and society in general—or at least the society that "
4847 "inherits the tradition that gave us the film industry, the record industry, "
4848 "the radio industry, cable TV, and the VCR—the question is not simply "
4849 "whether type A sharing is harmful. The question is also "
4850 "<emphasis>how</emphasis> harmful type A sharing is, and how beneficial the "
4851 "other types of sharing are."
4854 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4855 #: freeculture.xml:3678
4857 "We start to answer this question by focusing on the net harm, from the "
4858 "standpoint of the industry as a whole, that sharing networks cause. The "
4859 "\"net harm\" to the industry as a whole is the amount by which type A "
4860 "sharing exceeds type B. If the record companies sold more records through "
4861 "sampling than they lost through substitution, then sharing networks would "
4862 "actually benefit music companies on balance. They would therefore have "
4863 "little <emphasis>static</emphasis> reason to resist them."
4866 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4867 #: freeculture.xml:3689
4869 "Could that be true? Could the industry as a whole be gaining because of file "
4870 "sharing? Odd as that might sound, the data about CD sales actually suggest "
4871 "it might be close."
4875 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4876 #: freeculture.xml:3698
4878 "See Recording Industry Association of America, <citetitle>2002 Yearend "
4879 "Statistics</citetitle>, available at <ulink "
4880 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #15</ulink>. A later report "
4881 "indicates even greater losses. See Recording Industry Association of "
4882 "America, <citetitle>Some Facts About Music Piracy</citetitle>, 25 June 2003, "
4883 "available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #16</ulink>: "
4884 "\"In the past four years, unit shipments of recorded music have fallen by 26 "
4885 "percent from 1.16 billion units in to 860 million units in 2002 in the "
4886 "United States (based on units shipped). In terms of sales, revenues are "
4887 "down 14 percent, from $14.6 billion in to $12.6 billion last year (based on "
4888 "U.S. dollar value of shipments). The music industry worldwide has gone from "
4889 "a $39 billion industry in 2000 down to a $32 billion industry in 2002 (based "
4890 "on U.S. dollar value of shipments).\""
4893 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
4894 #: freeculture.xml:3725
4898 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4899 #: freeculture.xml:3722
4901 "Jane Black, \"Big Music's Broken Record,\" BusinessWeek online, 13 February "
4902 "2003, available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
4903 "#17</ulink>. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
4906 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4907 #: freeculture.xml:3694
4909 "In 2002, the RIAA reported that CD sales had fallen by 8.9 percent, from 882 "
4910 "million to 803 million units; revenues fell 6.7 percent.<placeholder "
4911 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> This confirms a trend over the past few "
4912 "years. The RIAA blames Internet piracy for the trend, though there are many "
4913 "other causes that could account for this drop. SoundScan, for example, "
4914 "reports a more than 20 percent drop in the number of CDs released since "
4915 "1999. That no doubt accounts for some of the decrease in sales. Rising "
4916 "prices could account for at least some of the loss. \"From 1999 to 2001, the "
4917 "average price of a CD rose 7.2 percent, from $13.04 to $14.19.\"<placeholder "
4918 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> Competition from other forms of media could "
4919 "also account for some of the decline. As Jane Black of "
4920 "<citetitle>BusinessWeek</citetitle> notes, \"The soundtrack to the film "
4921 "<citetitle>High Fidelity</citetitle> has a list price of $18.98. You could "
4922 "get the whole movie [on DVD] for $19.99.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
4927 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4928 #: freeculture.xml:3740
4930 "But let's assume the RIAA is right, and all of the decline in CD sales is "
4931 "because of Internet sharing. Here's the rub: In the same period that the "
4932 "RIAA estimates that 803 million CDs were sold, the RIAA estimates that 2.1 "
4933 "billion CDs were downloaded for free. Thus, although 2.6 times the total "
4934 "number of CDs sold were downloaded for free, sales revenue fell by just 6.7 "
4938 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4939 #: freeculture.xml:3748
4941 "There are too many different things happening at the same time to explain "
4942 "these numbers definitively, but one conclusion is unavoidable: The recording "
4943 "industry constantly asks, \"What's the difference between downloading a song "
4944 "and stealing a CD?\"—but their own numbers reveal the difference. If I "
4945 "steal a CD, then there is one less CD to sell. Every taking is a lost "
4946 "sale. But on the basis of the numbers the RIAA provides, it is absolutely "
4947 "clear that the same is not true of downloads. If every download were a lost "
4948 "sale—if every use of Kazaa \"rob[bed] the author of [his] "
4949 "profit\"—then the industry would have suffered a 100 percent drop in "
4950 "sales last year, not a 7 percent drop. If 2.6 times the number of CDs sold "
4951 "were downloaded for free, and yet sales revenue dropped by just 6.7 percent, "
4952 "then there is a huge difference between \"downloading a song and stealing a "
4956 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4957 #: freeculture.xml:3763
4959 "These are the harms—alleged and perhaps exaggerated but, let's assume, "
4960 "real. What of the benefits? File sharing may impose costs on the recording "
4961 "industry. What value does it produce in addition to these costs?"
4965 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4966 #: freeculture.xml:3775
4968 "By one estimate, 75 percent of the music released by the major labels is no "
4969 "longer in print. See Online Entertainment and Copyright Law—Coming "
4970 "Soon to a Digital Device Near You: Hearing Before the Senate Committee on "
4971 "the Judiciary, 107th Cong., 1st sess. (3 April 2001) (prepared statement of "
4972 "the Future of Music Coalition), available at <ulink "
4973 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #18</ulink>."
4976 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
4977 #: freeculture.xml:3769
4979 "One benefit is type C sharing—making available content that is "
4980 "technically still under copyright but is no longer commercially available. "
4981 "This is not a small category of content. There are millions of tracks that "
4982 "are no longer commercially available.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
4983 "id=\"0\"/> And while it's conceivable that some of this content is not "
4984 "available because the artist producing the content doesn't want it to be "
4985 "made available, the vast majority of it is unavailable solely because the "
4986 "publisher or the distributor has decided it no longer makes economic sense "
4987 "<emphasis>to the company</emphasis> to make it available."
4991 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
4992 #: freeculture.xml:3795
4994 "While there are not good estimates of the number of used record stores in "
4995 "existence, in 2002, there were 7,198 used book dealers in the United States, "
4996 "an increase of 20 percent since 1993. See Book Hunter Press, <citetitle>The "
4997 "Quiet Revolution: The Expansion of the Used Book Market</citetitle> (2002), "
4998 "available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
4999 "#19</ulink>. Used records accounted for $260 million in sales in 2002. See "
5000 "National Association of Recording Merchandisers, \"2002 Annual Survey "
5001 "Results,\" available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
5005 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5006 #: freeculture.xml:3789
5008 "In real space—long before the Internet—the market had a simple "
5009 "response to this problem: used book and record stores. There are thousands "
5010 "of used book and used record stores in America today.<placeholder "
5011 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> These stores buy content from owners, then sell "
5012 "the content they buy. And under American copyright law, when they buy and "
5013 "sell this content, <emphasis>even if the content is still under "
5014 "copyright</emphasis>, the copyright owner doesn't get a dime. Used book and "
5015 "record stores are commercial entities; their owners make money from the "
5016 "content they sell; but as with cable companies before statutory licensing, "
5017 "they don't have to pay the copyright owner for the content they sell."
5020 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
5021 #: freeculture.xml:3815
5022 msgid "Bernstein, Leonard"
5025 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5026 #: freeculture.xml:3817
5028 "Type C sharing, then, is very much like used book stores or used record "
5029 "stores. It is different, of course, because the person making the content "
5030 "available isn't making money from making the content available. It is also "
5031 "different, of course, because in real space, when I sell a record, I don't "
5032 "have it anymore, while in cyberspace, when someone shares my 1949 recording "
5033 "of Bernstein's \"Two Love Songs,\" I still have it. That difference would "
5034 "matter economically if the owner of the copyright were selling the record in "
5035 "competition to my sharing. But we're talking about the class of content that "
5036 "is not currently commercially available. The Internet is making it "
5037 "available, through cooperative sharing, without competing with the market."
5040 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5041 #: freeculture.xml:3830
5043 "It may well be, all things considered, that it would be better if the "
5044 "copyright owner got something from this trade. But just because it may well "
5045 "be better, it doesn't follow that it would be good to ban used book "
5046 "stores. Or put differently, if you think that type C sharing should be "
5047 "stopped, do you think that libraries and used book stores should be shut as "
5052 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5053 #: freeculture.xml:3838
5055 "Finally, and perhaps most importantly, file-sharing networks enable type D "
5056 "sharing to occur—the sharing of content that copyright owners want to "
5057 "have shared or for which there is no continuing copyright. This sharing "
5058 "clearly benefits authors and society. Science fiction author Cory Doctorow, "
5059 "for example, released his first novel, <citetitle>Down and Out in the Magic "
5060 "Kingdom</citetitle>, both free on-line and in bookstores on the same "
5061 "day. His (and his publisher's) thinking was that the on-line distribution "
5062 "would be a great advertisement for the \"real\" book. People would read part "
5063 "on-line, and then decide whether they liked the book or not. If they liked "
5064 "it, they would be more likely to buy it. Doctorow's content is type D "
5065 "content. If sharing networks enable his work to be spread, then both he and "
5066 "society are better off. (Actually, much better off: It is a great book!)"
5069 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5070 #: freeculture.xml:3855
5072 "Likewise for work in the public domain: This sharing benefits society with "
5073 "no legal harm to authors at all. If efforts to solve the problem of type A "
5074 "sharing destroy the opportunity for type D sharing, then we lose something "
5075 "important in order to protect type A content."
5078 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5079 #: freeculture.xml:3861
5081 "The point throughout is this: While the recording industry understandably "
5082 "says, \"This is how much we've lost,\" we must also ask, \"How much has "
5083 "society gained from p2p sharing? What are the efficiencies? What is the "
5084 "content that otherwise would be unavailable?\""
5087 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5088 #: freeculture.xml:3868
5090 "For unlike the piracy I described in the first section of this chapter, much "
5091 "of the \"piracy\" that file sharing enables is plainly legal and good. And "
5092 "like the piracy I described in chapter 4, much of this piracy is motivated "
5093 "by a new way of spreading content caused by changes in the technology of "
5094 "distribution. Thus, consistent with the tradition that gave us Hollywood, "
5095 "radio, the recording industry, and cable TV, the question we should be "
5096 "asking about file sharing is how best to preserve its benefits while "
5097 "minimizing (to the extent possible) the wrongful harm it causes artists. The "
5098 "question is one of balance. The law should seek that balance, and that "
5099 "balance will be found only with time."
5102 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5103 #: freeculture.xml:3881
5105 "\"But isn't the war just a war against illegal sharing? Isn't the target "
5106 "just what you call type A sharing?\""
5110 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
5111 #: freeculture.xml:3898
5113 "See Transcript of Proceedings, In Re: Napster Copyright Litigation at 34- 35 "
5114 "(N.D. Cal., 11 July 2001), nos. MDL-00-1369 MHP, C 99-5183 MHP, available at "
5115 "<ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #21</ulink>. For an "
5116 "account of the litigation and its toll on Napster, see Joseph Menn, "
5117 "<citetitle>All the Rave: The Rise and Fall of Shawn Fanning's "
5118 "Napster</citetitle> (New York: Crown Business, 2003), 269–82."
5121 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5122 #: freeculture.xml:3885
5124 "You would think. And we should hope. But so far, it is not. The effect of "
5125 "the war purportedly on type A sharing alone has been felt far beyond that "
5126 "one class of sharing. That much is obvious from the Napster case "
5127 "itself. When Napster told the district court that it had developed a "
5128 "technology to block the transfer of 99.4 percent of identified infringing "
5129 "material, the district court told counsel for Napster 99.4 percent was not "
5130 "good enough. Napster had to push the infringements \"down to "
5131 "zero.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
5134 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5135 #: freeculture.xml:3909
5137 "If 99.4 percent is not good enough, then this is a war on file-sharing "
5138 "technologies, not a war on copyright infringement. There is no way to assure "
5139 "that a p2p system is used 100 percent of the time in compliance with the "
5140 "law, any more than there is a way to assure that 100 percent of VCRs or 100 "
5141 "percent of Xerox machines or 100 percent of handguns are used in compliance "
5142 "with the law. Zero tolerance means zero p2p. The court's ruling means that "
5143 "we as a society must lose the benefits of p2p, even for the totally legal "
5144 "and beneficial uses they serve, simply to assure that there are zero "
5145 "copyright infringements caused by p2p."
5148 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5149 #: freeculture.xml:3920
5151 "Zero tolerance has not been our history. It has not produced the content "
5152 "industry that we know today. The history of American law has been a process "
5153 "of balance. As new technologies changed the way content was distributed, the "
5154 "law adjusted, after some time, to the new technology. In this adjustment, "
5155 "the law sought to ensure the legitimate rights of creators while protecting "
5156 "innovation. Sometimes this has meant more rights for creators. Sometimes "
5160 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5161 #: freeculture.xml:3929
5163 "So, as we've seen, when \"mechanical reproduction\" threatened the interests "
5164 "of composers, Congress balanced the rights of composers against the "
5165 "interests of the recording industry. It granted rights to composers, but "
5166 "also to the recording artists: Composers were to be paid, but at a price set "
5167 "by Congress. But when radio started broadcasting the recordings made by "
5168 "these recording artists, and they complained to Congress that their "
5169 "\"creative property\" was not being respected (since the radio station did "
5170 "not have to pay them for the creativity it broadcast), Congress rejected "
5171 "their claim. An indirect benefit was enough."
5174 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5175 #: freeculture.xml:3941
5177 "Cable TV followed the pattern of record albums. When the courts rejected the "
5178 "claim that cable broadcasters had to pay for the content they rebroadcast, "
5179 "Congress responded by giving broadcasters a right to compensation, but at a "
5180 "level set by the law. It likewise gave cable companies the right to the "
5181 "content, so long as they paid the statutory price."
5185 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5186 #: freeculture.xml:3951
5188 "This compromise, like the compromise affecting records and player pianos, "
5189 "served two important goals—indeed, the two central goals of any "
5190 "copyright legislation. First, the law assured that new innovators would have "
5191 "the freedom to develop new ways to deliver content. Second, the law assured "
5192 "that copyright holders would be paid for the content that was "
5193 "distributed. One fear was that if Congress simply required cable TV to pay "
5194 "copyright holders whatever they demanded for their content, then copyright "
5195 "holders associated with broadcasters would use their power to stifle this "
5196 "new technology, cable. But if Congress had permitted cable to use "
5197 "broadcasters' content for free, then it would have unfairly subsidized "
5198 "cable. Thus Congress chose a path that would assure "
5199 "<emphasis>compensation</emphasis> without giving the past (broadcasters) "
5200 "control over the future (cable)."
5203 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
5204 #: freeculture.xml:3966
5208 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5209 #: freeculture.xml:3968
5211 "In the same year that Congress struck this balance, two major producers and "
5212 "distributors of film content filed a lawsuit against another technology, the "
5213 "video tape recorder (VTR, or as we refer to them today, VCRs) that Sony had "
5214 "produced, the Betamax. Disney's and Universal's claim against Sony was "
5215 "relatively simple: Sony produced a device, Disney and Universal claimed, "
5216 "that enabled consumers to engage in copyright infringement. Because the "
5217 "device that Sony built had a \"record\" button, the device could be used to "
5218 "record copyrighted movies and shows. Sony was therefore benefiting from the "
5219 "copyright infringement of its customers. It should therefore, Disney and "
5220 "Universal claimed, be partially liable for that infringement."
5224 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5225 #: freeculture.xml:3981
5227 "There was something to Disney's and Universal's claim. Sony did decide to "
5228 "design its machine to make it very simple to record television shows. It "
5229 "could have built the machine to block or inhibit any direct copying from a "
5230 "television broadcast. Or possibly, it could have built the machine to copy "
5231 "only if there were a special \"copy me\" signal on the line. It was clear "
5232 "that there were many television shows that did not grant anyone permission "
5233 "to copy. Indeed, if anyone had asked, no doubt the majority of shows would "
5234 "not have authorized copying. And in the face of this obvious preference, "
5235 "Sony could have designed its system to minimize the opportunity for "
5236 "copyright infringement. It did not, and for that, Disney and Universal "
5237 "wanted to hold it responsible for the architecture it chose."
5241 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
5242 #: freeculture.xml:4003
5244 "Copyright Infringements (Audio and Video Recorders): Hearing on S. 1758 "
5245 "Before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, 97th Cong., 1st and 2nd sess., "
5246 "459 (1982) (testimony of Jack Valenti, president, Motion Picture Association "
5247 "of America, Inc.)."
5251 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
5252 #: freeculture.xml:4015
5253 msgid "Copyright Infringements (Audio and Video Recorders), 475."
5257 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
5258 #: freeculture.xml:4020
5260 "<citetitle>Universal City Studios, Inc</citetitle>. v. <citetitle>Sony "
5261 "Corp. of America</citetitle>, 480 F. Supp. 429, (C.D. Cal., 1979)."
5265 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
5266 #: freeculture.xml:4031
5268 "Copyright Infringements (Audio and Video Recorders), 485 (testimony of Jack "
5272 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5273 #: freeculture.xml:3996
5275 "MPAA president Jack Valenti became the studios' most vocal champion. Valenti "
5276 "called VCRs \"tapeworms.\" He warned, \"When there are 20, 30, 40 million of "
5277 "these VCRs in the land, we will be invaded by millions of `tapeworms,' "
5278 "eating away at the very heart and essence of the most precious asset the "
5279 "copyright owner has, his copyright.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
5280 "id=\"0\"/> \"One does not have to be trained in sophisticated marketing and "
5281 "creative judgment,\" he told Congress, \"to understand the devastation on "
5282 "the after-theater marketplace caused by the hundreds of millions of tapings "
5283 "that will adversely impact on the future of the creative community in this "
5284 "country. It is simply a question of basic economics and plain common "
5285 "sense.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> Indeed, as surveys would "
5286 "later show, percent of VCR owners had movie libraries of ten videos or "
5287 "more<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"2\"/> — a use the Court would "
5288 "later hold was not \"fair.\" By \"allowing VCR owners to copy freely by the "
5289 "means of an exemption from copyright infringementwithout creating a "
5290 "mechanism to compensate copyrightowners,\" Valenti testified, Congress would "
5291 "\"take from the owners the very essence of their property: the exclusive "
5292 "right to control who may use their work, that is, who may copy it and "
5293 "thereby profit from its reproduction.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
5298 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
5299 #: freeculture.xml:4048
5301 "<citetitle>Universal City Studios, Inc</citetitle>. v. <citetitle>Sony "
5302 "Corp. of America</citetitle>, 659 F. 2d 963 (9th Cir. 1981)."
5305 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5306 #: freeculture.xml:4036
5308 "It took eight years for this case to be resolved by the Supreme Court. In "
5309 "the interim, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which includes Hollywood in "
5310 "its jurisdiction—leading Judge Alex Kozinski, who sits on that court, "
5311 "refers to it as the \"Hollywood Circuit\"—held that Sony would be "
5312 "liable for the copyright infringement made possible by its machines. Under "
5313 "the Ninth Circuit's rule, this totally familiar technology—which Jack "
5314 "Valenti had called \"the Boston Strangler of the American film industry\" "
5315 "(worse yet, it was a <emphasis>Japanese</emphasis> Boston Strangler of the "
5316 "American film industry)—was an illegal technology.<placeholder "
5317 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
5321 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5322 #: freeculture.xml:4053
5324 "But the Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Ninth Circuit. And in "
5325 "its reversal, the Court clearly articulated its understanding of when and "
5326 "whether courts should intervene in such disputes. As the Court wrote,"
5330 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
5331 #: freeculture.xml:4072
5333 "<citetitle>Sony Corp. of America</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Universal City "
5334 "Studios, Inc</citetitle>., 464 U.S. 417, 431 (1984)."
5337 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
5338 #: freeculture.xml:4062
5340 "Sound policy, as well as history, supports our consistent deference to "
5341 "Congress when major technological innovations alter the market for "
5342 "copyrighted materials. Congress has the constitutional authority and the "
5343 "institutional ability to accommodate fully the varied permutations of "
5344 "competing interests that are inevitably implicated by such new "
5345 "technology.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
5348 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5349 #: freeculture.xml:4077
5351 "Congress was asked to respond to the Supreme Court's decision. But as with "
5352 "the plea of recording artists about radio broadcasts, Congress ignored the "
5353 "request. Congress was convinced that American film got enough, this "
5354 "\"taking\" notwithstanding. If we put these cases together, a pattern is "
5358 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><title>
5359 #: freeculture.xml:4085
5363 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><thead><row><entry>
5364 #: freeculture.xml:4089
5368 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><thead><row><entry>
5369 #: freeculture.xml:4090
5370 msgid "WHOSE VALUE WAS \"PIRATED\""
5373 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><thead><row><entry>
5374 #: freeculture.xml:4091
5375 msgid "RESPONSE OF THE COURTS"
5378 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><thead><row><entry>
5379 #: freeculture.xml:4092
5380 msgid "RESPONSE OF CONGRESS"
5383 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
5384 #: freeculture.xml:4097
5388 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
5389 #: freeculture.xml:4098
5393 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
5394 #: freeculture.xml:4099 freeculture.xml:4111 freeculture.xml:4117
5395 msgid "No protection"
5398 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
5399 #: freeculture.xml:4100 freeculture.xml:4112
5400 msgid "Statutory license"
5403 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
5404 #: freeculture.xml:4104
5405 msgid "Recording artists"
5408 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
5409 #: freeculture.xml:4105
5413 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
5414 #: freeculture.xml:4106 freeculture.xml:4118
5418 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
5419 #: freeculture.xml:4110
5420 msgid "Broadcasters"
5423 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
5424 #: freeculture.xml:4115
5428 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
5429 #: freeculture.xml:4116
5430 msgid "Film creators"
5433 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
5434 #: freeculture.xml:4128
5436 "These are the most important instances in our history, but there are other "
5437 "cases as well. The technology of digital audio tape (DAT), for example, was "
5438 "regulated by Congress to minimize the risk of piracy. The remedy Congress "
5439 "imposed did burden DAT producers, by taxing tape sales and controlling the "
5440 "technology of DAT. See Audio Home Recording Act of 1992 (Title 17 of the "
5441 "<citetitle>United States Code</citetitle>), Pub. L. No. 102-563, 106 Stat. "
5442 "4237, codified at 17 U.S.C. §1001. Again, however, this regulation did not "
5443 "eliminate the opportunity for free riding in the sense I've described. See "
5444 "Lessig, <citetitle>Future</citetitle>, 71. See also Picker, \"From Edison to "
5445 "the Broadcast Flag,\" <citetitle>University of Chicago Law "
5446 "Review</citetitle> 70 (2003): 293–96. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
5450 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5451 #: freeculture.xml:4125
5453 "In each case throughout our history, a new technology changed the way "
5454 "content was distributed.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> In each "
5455 "case, throughout our history, that change meant that someone got a \"free "
5456 "ride\" on someone else's work."
5460 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5461 #: freeculture.xml:4145
5463 "In <emphasis>none</emphasis> of these cases did either the courts or "
5464 "Congress eliminate all free riding. In <emphasis>none</emphasis> of these "
5465 "cases did the courts or Congress insist that the law should assure that the "
5466 "copyright holder get all the value that his copyright created. In every "
5467 "case, the copyright owners complained of \"piracy.\" In every case, Congress "
5468 "acted to recognize some of the legitimacy in the behavior of the "
5469 "\"pirates.\" In each case, Congress allowed some new technology to benefit "
5470 "from content made before. It balanced the interests at stake."
5473 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5474 #: freeculture.xml:4157
5476 "When you think across these examples, and the other examples that make up "
5477 "the first four chapters of this section, this balance makes sense. Was Walt "
5478 "Disney a pirate? Would doujinshi be better if creators had to ask "
5479 "permission? Should tools that enable others to capture and spread images as "
5480 "a way to cultivate or criticize our culture be better regulated? Is it "
5481 "really right that building a search engine should expose you to $15 million "
5482 "in damages? Would it have been better if Edison had controlled film? Should "
5483 "every cover band have to hire a lawyer to get permission to record a song?"
5487 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
5488 #: freeculture.xml:4174
5490 "<citetitle>Sony Corp. of America</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Universal City "
5491 "Studios, Inc</citetitle>., 464 U.S. 417, (1984)."
5494 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5495 #: freeculture.xml:4169
5497 "We could answer yes to each of these questions, but our tradition has "
5498 "answered no. In our tradition, as the Supreme Court has stated, copyright "
5499 "\"has never accorded the copyright owner complete control over all possible "
5500 "uses of his work.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Instead, the "
5501 "particular uses that the law regulates have been defined by balancing the "
5502 "good that comes from granting an exclusive right against the burdens such an "
5503 "exclusive right creates. And this balancing has historically been done "
5504 "<emphasis>after</emphasis> a technology has matured, or settled into the mix "
5505 "of technologies that facilitate the distribution of content."
5508 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5509 #: freeculture.xml:4185
5511 "We should be doing the same thing today. The technology of the Internet is "
5512 "changing quickly. The way people connect to the Internet (wires "
5513 "vs. wireless) is changing very quickly. No doubt the network should not "
5514 "become a tool for \"stealing\" from artists. But neither should the law "
5515 "become a tool to entrench one particular way in which artists (or more "
5516 "accurately, distributors) get paid. As I describe in some detail in the last "
5517 "chapter of this book, we should be securing income to artists while we allow "
5518 "the market to secure the most efficient way to promote and distribute "
5519 "content. This will require changes in the law, at least in the "
5520 "interim. These changes should be designed to balance the protection of the "
5521 "law against the strong public interest that innovation continue."
5525 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
5526 #: freeculture.xml:4209
5528 "John Schwartz, \"New Economy: The Attack on Peer-to-Peer Software Echoes "
5529 "Past Efforts,\" <citetitle>New York Times</citetitle>, 22 September 2003, "
5533 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5534 #: freeculture.xml:4201
5536 "This is especially true when a new technology enables a vastly superior mode "
5537 "of distribution. And this p2p has done. P2p technologies can be ideally "
5538 "efficient in moving content across a widely diverse network. Left to "
5539 "develop, they could make the network vastly more efficient. Yet these "
5540 "\"potential public benefits,\" as John Schwartz writes in <citetitle>The New "
5541 "York Times</citetitle>, \"could be delayed in the P2P fight.\"<placeholder "
5542 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Yet when anyone begins to talk about "
5543 "\"balance,\" the copyright warriors raise a different argument. \"All this "
5544 "hand waving about balance and incentives,\" they say, \"misses a fundamental "
5545 "point. Our content,\" the warriors insist, \"is our "
5546 "<emphasis>property</emphasis>. Why should we wait for Congress to "
5547 "`rebalance' our property rights? Do you have to wait before calling the "
5548 "police when your car has been stolen? And why should Congress deliberate at "
5549 "all about the merits of this theft? Do we ask whether the car thief had a "
5550 "good use for the car before we arrest him?\""
5553 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
5554 #: freeculture.xml:4223
5556 "\"It is <emphasis>our property</emphasis>,\" the warriors insist. \"And it "
5557 "should be protected just as any other property is protected.\""
5560 #. type: Content of: <book><part><title>
5561 #: freeculture.xml:4231
5562 msgid "\"PROPERTY\""
5566 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
5567 #: freeculture.xml:4236
5569 "The copyright warriors are right: A copyright is a kind of property. It can "
5570 "be owned and sold, and the law protects against its theft. Ordinarily, the "
5571 "copyright owner gets to hold out for any price he wants. Markets reckon the "
5572 "supply and demand that partially determine the price she can get."
5575 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
5576 #: freeculture.xml:4243
5578 "But in ordinary language, to call a copyright a \"property\" right is a bit "
5579 "misleading, for the property of copyright is an odd kind of property. "
5580 "Indeed, the very idea of property in any idea or any expression is very "
5581 "odd. I understand what I am taking when I take the picnic table you put in "
5582 "your backyard. I am taking a thing, the picnic table, and after I take it, "
5583 "you don't have it. But what am I taking when I take the good "
5584 "<emphasis>idea</emphasis> you had to put a picnic table in the "
5585 "backyard—by, for example, going to Sears, buying a table, and putting "
5586 "it in my backyard? What is the thing I am taking then?"
5590 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
5591 #: freeculture.xml:4268
5593 "Letter from Thomas Jefferson to Isaac McPherson (13 August 1813) in "
5594 "<citetitle>The Writings of Thomas Jefferson</citetitle>, vol. 6 (Andrew "
5595 "A. Lipscomb and Albert Ellery Bergh, eds., 1903), 330, 333–34."
5598 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
5599 #: freeculture.xml:4255
5601 "The point is not just about the thingness of picnic tables versus ideas, "
5602 "though that's an important difference. The point instead is that in the "
5603 "ordinary case—indeed, in practically every case except for a narrow "
5604 "range of exceptions—ideas released to the world are free. I don't take "
5605 "anything from you when I copy the way you dress—though I might seem "
5606 "weird if I did it every day, and especially weird if you are a "
5607 "woman. Instead, as Thomas Jefferson said (and as is especially true when I "
5608 "copy the way someone else dresses), \"He who receives an idea from me, "
5609 "receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his "
5610 "taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.\"<placeholder "
5611 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
5614 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
5615 #: freeculture.xml:4274
5617 "The exceptions to free use are ideas and expressions within the reach of the "
5618 "law of patent and copyright, and a few other domains that I won't discuss "
5619 "here. Here the law says you can't take my idea or expression without my "
5620 "permission: The law turns the intangible into property."
5624 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
5625 #: freeculture.xml:4287
5627 "As the legal realists taught American law, all property rights are "
5628 "intangible. A property right is simply a right that an individual has "
5629 "against the world to do or not do certain things that may or may not attach "
5630 "to a physical object. The right itself is intangible, even if the object to "
5631 "which it is (metaphorically) attached is tangible. See Adam Mossoff, \"What "
5632 "Is Property? Putting the Pieces Back Together,\" <citetitle>Arizona Law "
5633 "Review</citetitle> 45 (2003): 373, 429 n. 241."
5636 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
5637 #: freeculture.xml:4282
5639 "But how, and to what extent, and in what form—the details, in other "
5640 "words—matter. To get a good sense of how this practice of turning the "
5641 "intangible into property emerged, we need to place this \"property\" in its "
5642 "proper context.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
5645 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
5646 #: freeculture.xml:4297
5648 "My strategy in doing this will be the same as my strategy in the preceding "
5649 "part. I offer four stories to help put the idea of \"copyright material is "
5650 "property\" in context. Where did the idea come from? What are its limits? "
5651 "How does it function in practice? After these stories, the significance of "
5652 "this true statement—\"copyright material is property\"— will be "
5653 "a bit more clear, and its implications will be revealed as quite different "
5654 "from the implications that the copyright warriors would have us draw."
5657 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
5658 #: freeculture.xml:4310
5659 msgid "CHAPTER SIX: Founders"
5662 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5663 #: freeculture.xml:4312
5665 "William Shakespeare wrote <citetitle>Romeo and Juliet</citetitle> in "
5666 "1595. The play was first published in 1597. It was the eleventh major play "
5667 "that Shakespeare had written. He would continue to write plays through 1613, "
5668 "and the plays that he wrote have continued to define Anglo-American culture "
5669 "ever since. So deeply have the works of a sixteenth-century writer seeped "
5670 "into our culture that we often don't even recognize their source. I once "
5671 "overheard someone commenting on Kenneth Branagh's adaptation of Henry V: \"I "
5672 "liked it, but Shakespeare is so full of clichés.\""
5676 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
5677 #: freeculture.xml:4327
5679 "Jacob Tonson is typically remembered for his associations with prominent "
5680 "eighteenth-century literary figures, especially John Dryden, and for his "
5681 "handsome \"definitive editions\" of classic works. In addition to "
5682 "<citetitle>Romeo and Juliet</citetitle>, he published an astonishing array "
5683 "of works that still remain at the heart of the English canon, including "
5684 "collected works of Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, John Milton, and John "
5685 "Dryden. See Keith Walker, \"Jacob Tonson, Bookseller,\" <citetitle>American "
5686 "Scholar</citetitle> 61:3 (1992): 424–31."
5690 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
5691 #: freeculture.xml:4338
5693 "Lyman Ray Patterson, <citetitle>Copyright in Historical "
5694 "Perspective</citetitle> (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 1968), "
5699 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5700 #: freeculture.xml:4323
5702 "In 1774, almost 180 years after <citetitle>Romeo and Juliet</citetitle> was "
5703 "written, the \"copy-right\" for the work was still thought by many to be the "
5704 "exclusive right of a single London publisher, Jacob Tonson.<placeholder "
5705 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Tonson was the most prominent of a small group "
5706 "of publishers called the Conger<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> who "
5707 "controlled bookselling in England during the eighteenth century. The Conger "
5708 "claimed a perpetual right to control the \"copy\" of books that they had "
5709 "acquired from authors. That perpetual right meant that no one else could "
5710 "publish copies of a book to which they held the copyright. Prices of the "
5711 "classics were thus kept high; competition to produce better or cheaper "
5712 "editions was eliminated."
5715 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
5716 #: freeculture.xml:4360
5718 "As Siva Vaidhyanathan nicely argues, it is erroneous to call this a "
5719 "\"copyright law.\" See Vaidhyanathan, <citetitle>Copyrights and "
5720 "Copywrongs</citetitle>, 40. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
5723 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5724 #: freeculture.xml:4351
5726 "Now, there's something puzzling about the year 1774 to anyone who knows a "
5727 "little about copyright law. The better-known year in the history of "
5728 "copyright is 1710, the year that the British Parliament adopted the first "
5729 "\"copyright\" act. Known as the Statute of Anne, the act stated that all "
5730 "published works would get a copyright term of fourteen years, renewable once "
5731 "if the author was alive, and that all works already published by 1710 would "
5732 "get a single term of twenty-one additional years.<placeholder "
5733 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Under this law, <citetitle>Romeo and "
5734 "Juliet</citetitle> should have been free in 1731. So why was there any issue "
5735 "about it still being under Tonson's control in 1774?"
5738 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
5739 #: freeculture.xml:4377
5740 msgid "Licensing Act (1662)"
5743 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5744 #: freeculture.xml:4368
5746 "The reason is that the English hadn't yet agreed on what a \"copyright\" "
5747 "was—indeed, no one had. At the time the English passed the Statute of "
5748 "Anne, there was no other legislation governing copyrights. The last law "
5749 "regulating publishers, the Licensing Act of 1662, had expired in 1695. That "
5750 "law gave publishers a monopoly over publishing, as a way to make it easier "
5751 "for the Crown to control what was published. But after it expired, there "
5752 "was no positive law that said that the publishers, or \"Stationers,\" had an "
5753 "exclusive right to print books. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
5756 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5757 #: freeculture.xml:4380
5759 "There was no <emphasis>positive</emphasis> law, but that didn't mean that "
5760 "there was no law. The Anglo-American legal tradition looks to both the words "
5761 "of legislatures and the words of judges to know the rules that are to govern "
5762 "how people are to behave. We call the words from legislatures \"positive "
5763 "law.\" We call the words from judges \"common law.\" The common law sets the "
5764 "background against which legislatures legislate; the legislature, "
5765 "ordinarily, can trump that background only if it passes a law to displace "
5766 "it. And so the real question after the licensing statutes had expired was "
5767 "whether the common law protected a copyright, independent of any positive "
5772 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5773 #: freeculture.xml:4392
5775 "This question was important to the publishers, or \"booksellers,\" as they "
5776 "were called, because there was growing competition from foreign "
5777 "publishers. The Scottish, in particular, were increasingly publishing and "
5778 "exporting books to England. That competition reduced the profits of the "
5779 "Conger, which reacted by demanding that Parliament pass a law to again give "
5780 "them exclusive control over publishing. That demand ultimately resulted in "
5781 "the Statute of Anne."
5784 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5785 #: freeculture.xml:4404
5787 "The Statute of Anne granted the author or \"proprietor\" of a book an "
5788 "exclusive right to print that book. In an important limitation, however, and "
5789 "to the horror of the booksellers, the law gave the bookseller that right for "
5790 "a limited term. At the end of that term, the copyright \"expired,\" and the "
5791 "work would then be free and could be published by anyone. Or so the "
5792 "legislature is thought to have believed."
5795 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5796 #: freeculture.xml:4413
5798 "Now, the thing to puzzle about for a moment is this: Why would Parliament "
5799 "limit the exclusive right? Not why would they limit it to the particular "
5800 "limit they set, but why would they limit the right <emphasis>at "
5804 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5805 #: freeculture.xml:4419
5807 "For the booksellers, and the authors whom they represented, had a very "
5808 "strong claim. Take <citetitle>Romeo and Juliet</citetitle> as an example: "
5809 "That play was written by Shakespeare. It was his genius that brought it into "
5810 "the world. He didn't take anybody's property when he created this play "
5811 "(that's a controversial claim, but never mind), and by his creating this "
5812 "play, he didn't make it any harder for others to craft a play. So why is it "
5813 "that the law would ever allow someone else to come along and take "
5814 "Shakespeare's play without his, or his estate's, permission? What reason is "
5815 "there to allow someone else to \"steal\" Shakespeare's work?"
5818 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5819 #: freeculture.xml:4430
5821 "The answer comes in two parts. We first need to see something special about "
5822 "the notion of \"copyright\" that existed at the time of the Statute of "
5823 "Anne. Second, we have to see something important about \"booksellers.\""
5827 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5828 #: freeculture.xml:4436
5830 "First, about copyright. In the last three hundred years, we have come to "
5831 "apply the concept of \"copyright\" ever more broadly. But in 1710, it wasn't "
5832 "so much a concept as it was a very particular right. The copyright was born "
5833 "as a very specific set of restrictions: It forbade others from reprinting a "
5834 "book. In 1710, the \"copy-right\" was a right to use a particular machine to "
5835 "replicate a particular work. It did not go beyond that very narrow right. It "
5836 "did not control any more generally how a work could be "
5837 "<emphasis>used</emphasis>. Today the right includes a large collection of "
5838 "restrictions on the freedom of others: It grants the author the exclusive "
5839 "right to copy, the exclusive right to distribute, the exclusive right to "
5840 "perform, and so on."
5843 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5844 #: freeculture.xml:4451
5846 "So, for example, even if the copyright to Shakespeare's works were "
5847 "perpetual, all that would have meant under the original meaning of the term "
5848 "was that no one could reprint Shakespeare's work without the permission of "
5849 "the Shakespeare estate. It would not have controlled anything, for example, "
5850 "about how the work could be performed, whether the work could be translated, "
5851 "or whether Kenneth Branagh would be allowed to make his films. The "
5852 "\"copy-right\" was only an exclusive right to print—no less, of "
5853 "course, but also no more."
5856 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5857 #: freeculture.xml:4463
5859 "Even that limited right was viewed with skepticism by the British. They had "
5860 "had a long and ugly experience with \"exclusive rights,\" especially "
5861 "\"exclusive rights\" granted by the Crown. The English had fought a civil "
5862 "war in part about the Crown's practice of handing out "
5863 "monopolies—especially monopolies for works that already existed. King "
5864 "Henry VIII granted a patent to print the Bible and a monopoly to Darcy to "
5865 "print playing cards. The English Parliament began to fight back against this "
5866 "power of the Crown. In 1656, it passed the Statute of Monopolies, limiting "
5867 "monopolies to patents for new inventions. And by 1710, Parliament was eager "
5868 "to deal with the growing monopoly in publishing."
5871 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5872 #: freeculture.xml:4479
5874 "Thus the \"copy-right,\" when viewed as a monopoly right, was naturally "
5875 "viewed as a right that should be limited. (However convincing the claim that "
5876 "\"it's my property, and I should have it forever,\" try sounding convincing "
5877 "when uttering, \"It's my monopoly, and I should have it forever.\") The "
5878 "state would protect the exclusive right, but only so long as it benefited "
5879 "society. The British saw the harms from specialinterest favors; they passed "
5880 "a law to stop them."
5884 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
5885 #: freeculture.xml:4505
5887 "Philip Wittenberg, <citetitle>The Protection and Marketing of Literary "
5888 "Property</citetitle> (New York: J. Messner, Inc., 1937), 31."
5891 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5892 #: freeculture.xml:4490
5894 "Second, about booksellers. It wasn't just that the copyright was a "
5895 "monopoly. It was also that it was a monopoly held by the booksellers. "
5896 "Booksellers sound quaint and harmless to us. They were not viewed as "
5897 "harmless in seventeenth-century England. Members of the Conger were "
5898 "increasingly seen as monopolists of the worst kind—tools of the "
5899 "Crown's repression, selling the liberty of England to guarantee themselves a "
5900 "monopoly profit. The attacks against these monopolists were harsh: Milton "
5901 "described them as \"old patentees and monopolizers in the trade of "
5902 "book-selling\"; they were \"men who do not therefore labour in an honest "
5903 "profession to which learning is indetted.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
5907 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5908 #: freeculture.xml:4510
5910 "Many believed the power the booksellers exercised over the spread of "
5911 "knowledge was harming that spread, just at the time the Enlightenment was "
5912 "teaching the importance of education and knowledge spread generally. The "
5913 "idea that knowledge should be free was a hallmark of the time, and these "
5914 "powerful commercial interests were interfering with that idea."
5917 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5918 #: freeculture.xml:4518
5920 "To balance this power, Parliament decided to increase competition among "
5921 "booksellers, and the simplest way to do that was to spread the wealth of "
5922 "valuable books. Parliament therefore limited the term of copyrights, and "
5923 "thereby guaranteed that valuable books would become open to any publisher to "
5924 "publish after a limited time. Thus the setting of the term for existing "
5925 "works to just twenty-one years was a compromise to fight the power of the "
5926 "booksellers. The limitation on terms was an indirect way to assure "
5927 "competition among publishers, and thus the construction and spread of "
5931 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5932 #: freeculture.xml:4530
5934 "When 1731 (1710 + 21) came along, however, the booksellers were getting "
5935 "anxious. They saw the consequences of more competition, and like every "
5936 "competitor, they didn't like them. At first booksellers simply ignored the "
5937 "Statute of Anne, continuing to insist on the perpetual right to control "
5938 "publication. But in 1735 and 1737, they tried to persuade Parliament to "
5939 "extend their terms. Twenty-one years was not enough, they said; they needed "
5943 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5944 #: freeculture.xml:4539
5946 "Parliament rejected their requests. As one pamphleteer put it, in words that "
5951 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
5952 #: freeculture.xml:4554
5954 "A Letter to a Member of Parliament concerning the Bill now depending in the "
5955 "House of Commons, for making more effectual an Act in the Eighth Year of the "
5956 "Reign of Queen Anne, entitled, An Act for the Encouragement of Learning, by "
5957 "Vesting the Copies of Printed Books in the Authors or Purchasers of such "
5958 "Copies, during the Times therein mentioned (London, 1735), in Brief Amici "
5959 "Curiae of Tyler T. Ochoa et al., 8, <citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> "
5960 "v. <citetitle>Ashcroft</citetitle>, 537 U.S. 186 (2003) (No. 01-618)."
5963 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
5964 #: freeculture.xml:4544
5966 "I see no Reason for granting a further Term now, which will not hold as well "
5967 "for granting it again and again, as often as the Old ones Expire; so that "
5968 "should this Bill pass, it will in Effect be establishing a perpetual "
5969 "Monopoly, a Thing deservedly odious in the Eye of the Law; it will be a "
5970 "great Cramp to Trade, a Discouragement to Learning, no Benefit to the "
5971 "Authors, but a general Tax on the Publick; and all this only to increase the "
5972 "private Gain of the Booksellers.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
5975 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
5976 #: freeculture.xml:4565
5978 "Having failed in Parliament, the publishers turned to the courts in a series "
5979 "of cases. Their argument was simple and direct: The Statute of Anne gave "
5980 "authors certain protections through positive law, but those protections were "
5981 "not intended as replacements for the common law. Instead, they were "
5982 "intended simply to supplement the common law. Under common law, it was "
5983 "already wrong to take another person's creative \"property\" and use it "
5984 "without his permission. The Statute of Anne, the booksellers argued, didn't "
5985 "change that. Therefore, just because the protections of the Statute of Anne "
5986 "expired, that didn't mean the protections of the common law expired: Under "
5987 "the common law they had the right to ban the publication of a book, even if "
5988 "its Statute of Anne copyright had expired. This, they argued, was the only "
5989 "way to protect authors."
5992 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
5993 #: freeculture.xml:4586
5995 "Lyman Ray Patterson, \"Free Speech, Copyright, and Fair Use,\" "
5996 "<citetitle>Vanderbilt Law Review</citetitle> 40 (1987): 28. For a "
5997 "wonderfully compelling account, see Vaidhyanathan, 37–48. "
5998 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
6001 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6002 #: freeculture.xml:4580
6004 "This was a clever argument, and one that had the support of some of the "
6005 "leading jurists of the day. It also displayed extraordinary chutzpah. Until "
6006 "then, as law professor Raymond Patterson has put it, \"The publishers "
6007 ". . . had as much concern for authors as a cattle rancher has for "
6008 "cattle.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The bookseller didn't "
6009 "care squat for the rights of the author. His concern was the monopoly "
6010 "profit that the author's work gave."
6014 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
6015 #: freeculture.xml:4599
6017 "For a compelling account, see David Saunders, <citetitle>Authorship and "
6018 "Copyright</citetitle> (London: Routledge, 1992), 62–69."
6021 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6022 #: freeculture.xml:4595
6024 "The booksellers' argument was not accepted without a fight. The hero of "
6025 "this fight was a Scottish bookseller named Alexander Donaldson.<placeholder "
6026 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
6030 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
6031 #: freeculture.xml:4609
6033 "Mark Rose, <citetitle>Authors and Owners</citetitle> (Cambridge: Harvard "
6034 "University Press, 1993), 92."
6038 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
6039 #: freeculture.xml:4619
6043 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
6044 #: freeculture.xml:4621
6045 msgid "Erskine, Andrew"
6048 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6049 #: freeculture.xml:4604
6051 "Donaldson was an outsider to the London Conger. He began his career in "
6052 "Edinburgh in 1750. The focus of his business was inexpensive reprints \"of "
6053 "standard works whose copyright term had expired,\" at least under the "
6054 "Statute of Anne.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Donaldson's "
6055 "publishing house prospered and became \"something of a center for literary "
6056 "Scotsmen.\" \"[A]mong them,\" Professor Mark Rose writes, was \"the young "
6057 "James Boswell who, together with his friend Andrew Erskine, published an "
6058 "anthology of contemporary Scottish poems with Donaldson.\"<placeholder "
6059 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"2\"/>"
6063 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
6064 #: freeculture.xml:4630
6066 "Lyman Ray Patterson, <citetitle>Copyright in Historical "
6067 "Perspective</citetitle>, 167 (quoting Borwell)."
6070 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6071 #: freeculture.xml:4624
6073 "When the London booksellers tried to shut down Donaldson's shop in Scotland, "
6074 "he responded by moving his shop to London, where he sold inexpensive "
6075 "editions \"of the most popular English books, in defiance of the supposed "
6076 "common law right of Literary Property.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
6077 "id=\"0\"/> His books undercut the Conger prices by 30 to 50 percent, and he "
6078 "rested his right to compete upon the ground that, under the Statute of Anne, "
6079 "the works he was selling had passed out of protection."
6082 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6083 #: freeculture.xml:4638
6085 "The London booksellers quickly brought suit to block \"piracy\" like "
6086 "Donaldson's. A number of actions were successful against the \"pirates,\" "
6087 "the most important early victory being <citetitle>Millar</citetitle> "
6088 "v. <citetitle>Taylor</citetitle>."
6092 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
6093 #: freeculture.xml:4650
6095 "Howard B. Abrams, \"The Historic Foundation of American Copyright Law: "
6096 "Exploding the Myth of Common Law Copyright,\" <citetitle>Wayne Law "
6097 "Review</citetitle> 29 (1983): 1152."
6100 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6101 #: freeculture.xml:4643
6103 "Millar was a bookseller who in 1729 had purchased the rights to James "
6104 "Thomson's poem \"The Seasons.\" Millar complied with the requirements of the "
6105 "Statute of Anne, and therefore received the full protection of the "
6106 "statute. After the term of copyright ended, Robert Taylor began printing a "
6107 "competing volume. Millar sued, claiming a perpetual common law right, the "
6108 "Statute of Anne notwithstanding.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
6111 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6112 #: freeculture.xml:4659
6114 "Astonishingly to modern lawyers, one of the greatest judges in English "
6115 "history, Lord Mansfield, agreed with the booksellers. Whatever protection "
6116 "the Statute of Anne gave booksellers, it did not, he held, extinguish any "
6117 "common law right. The question was whether the common law would protect the "
6118 "author against subsequent \"pirates.\" Mansfield's answer was yes: The "
6119 "common law would bar Taylor from reprinting Thomson's poem without Millar's "
6120 "permission. That common law rule thus effectively gave the booksellers a "
6121 "perpetual right to control the publication of any book assigned to them."
6125 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6126 #: freeculture.xml:4670
6128 "Considered as a matter of abstract justice—reasoning as if justice "
6129 "were just a matter of logical deduction from first "
6130 "principles—Mansfield's conclusion might make some sense. But what it "
6131 "ignored was the larger issue that Parliament had struggled with in 1710: How "
6132 "best to limit the monopoly power of publishers? Parliament's strategy was to "
6133 "offer a term for existing works that was long enough to buy peace in 1710, "
6134 "but short enough to assure that culture would pass into competition within a "
6135 "reasonable period of time. Within twenty-one years, Parliament believed, "
6136 "Britain would mature from the controlled culture that the Crown coveted to "
6137 "the free culture that we inherited."
6140 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6141 #: freeculture.xml:4685
6143 "The fight to defend the limits of the Statute of Anne was not to end there, "
6144 "however, and it is here that Donaldson enters the mix."
6147 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
6148 #: freeculture.xml:4688
6149 msgid "Beckett, Thomas"
6153 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
6154 #: freeculture.xml:4694
6155 msgid "Ibid., 1156."
6158 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6159 #: freeculture.xml:4690
6161 "Millar died soon after his victory, so his case was not appealed. His estate "
6162 "sold Thomson's poems to a syndicate of printers that included Thomas "
6163 "Beckett.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Donaldson then released an "
6164 "unauthorized edition of Thomson's works. Beckett, on the strength of the "
6165 "decision in <citetitle>Millar</citetitle>, got an injunction against "
6166 "Donaldson. Donaldson appealed the case to the House of Lords, which "
6167 "functioned much like our own Supreme Court. In February of 1774, that body "
6168 "had the chance to interpret the meaning of Parliament's limits from sixty "
6172 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6173 #: freeculture.xml:4704
6175 "As few legal cases ever do, <citetitle>Donaldson</citetitle> "
6176 "v. <citetitle>Beckett</citetitle> drew an enormous amount of attention "
6177 "throughout Britain. Donaldson's lawyers argued that whatever rights may have "
6178 "existed under the common law, the Statute of Anne terminated those "
6179 "rights. After passage of the Statute of Anne, the only legal protection for "
6180 "an exclusive right to control publication came from that statute. Thus, they "
6181 "argued, after the term specified in the Statute of Anne expired, works that "
6182 "had been protected by the statute were no longer protected."
6185 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6186 #: freeculture.xml:4714
6188 "The House of Lords was an odd institution. Legal questions were presented to "
6189 "the House and voted upon first by the \"law lords,\" members of special "
6190 "legal distinction who functioned much like the Justices in our Supreme "
6191 "Court. Then, after the law lords voted, the House of Lords generally voted."
6195 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6196 #: freeculture.xml:4721
6198 "The reports about the law lords' votes are mixed. On some counts, it looks "
6199 "as if perpetual copyright prevailed. But there is no ambiguity about how the "
6200 "House of Lords voted as whole. By a two-to-one majority (22 to 11) they "
6201 "voted to reject the idea of perpetual copyrights. Whatever one's "
6202 "understanding of the common law, now a copyright was fixed for a limited "
6203 "time, after which the work protected by copyright passed into the public "
6207 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
6208 #: freeculture.xml:4739
6209 msgid "Bacon, Francis"
6212 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
6213 #: freeculture.xml:4740
6214 msgid "Bunyan, John"
6217 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
6218 #: freeculture.xml:4741
6219 msgid "Johnson, Samuel"
6222 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
6223 #: freeculture.xml:4742
6224 msgid "Milton, John"
6227 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
6228 #: freeculture.xml:4743
6229 msgid "Shakespeare, William"
6232 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6233 #: freeculture.xml:4731
6235 "\"The public domain.\" Before the case of <citetitle>Donaldson</citetitle> "
6236 "v. <citetitle>Beckett</citetitle>, there was no clear idea of a public "
6237 "domain in England. Before 1774, there was a strong argument that common law "
6238 "copyrights were perpetual. After 1774, the public domain was born. For the "
6239 "first time in Anglo-American history, the legal control over creative works "
6240 "expired, and the greatest works in English history—including those of "
6241 "Shakespeare, Bacon, Milton, Johnson, and Bunyan—were free of legal "
6242 "restraint. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder "
6243 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"2\"/> "
6244 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"3\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
6249 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
6250 #: freeculture.xml:4756
6254 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6255 #: freeculture.xml:4746
6257 "It is hard for us to imagine, but this decision by the House of Lords fueled "
6258 "an extraordinarily popular and political reaction. In Scotland, where most "
6259 "of the \"pirate publishers\" did their work, people celebrated the decision "
6260 "in the streets. As the <citetitle>Edinburgh Advertiser</citetitle> reported, "
6261 "\"No private cause has so much engrossed the attention of the public, and "
6262 "none has been tried before the House of Lords in the decision of which so "
6263 "many individuals were interested.\" \"Great rejoicing in Edinburgh upon "
6264 "victory over literary property: bonfires and illuminations.\"<placeholder "
6265 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
6268 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6269 #: freeculture.xml:4760
6271 "In London, however, at least among publishers, the reaction was equally "
6272 "strong in the opposite direction. The <citetitle>Morning "
6273 "Chronicle</citetitle> reported:"
6276 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
6277 #: freeculture.xml:4766
6279 "By the above decision . . . near 200,000 pounds worth of what was honestly "
6280 "purchased at public sale, and which was yesterday thought property is now "
6281 "reduced to nothing. The Booksellers of London and Westminster, many of whom "
6282 "sold estates and houses to purchase Copy-right, are in a manner ruined, and "
6283 "those who after many years industry thought they had acquired a competency "
6284 "to provide for their families now find themselves without a shilling to "
6285 "devise to their successors.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
6289 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6290 #: freeculture.xml:4781
6292 "\"Ruined\" is a bit of an exaggeration. But it is not an exaggeration to say "
6293 "that the change was profound. The decision of the House of Lords meant that "
6294 "the booksellers could no longer control how culture in England would grow "
6295 "and develop. Culture in England was thereafter <emphasis>free</emphasis>. "
6296 "Not in the sense that copyrights would not be respected, for of course, for "
6297 "a limited time after a work was published, the bookseller had an exclusive "
6298 "right to control the publication of that book. And not in the sense that "
6299 "books could be stolen, for even after a copyright expired, you still had to "
6300 "buy the book from someone. But <emphasis>free</emphasis> in the sense that "
6301 "the culture and its growth would no longer be controlled by a small group of "
6302 "publishers. As every free market does, this free market of free culture "
6303 "would grow as the consumers and producers chose. English culture would "
6304 "develop as the many English readers chose to let it develop— chose in "
6305 "the books they bought and wrote; chose in the memes they repeated and "
6306 "endorsed. Chose in a <emphasis>competitive context</emphasis>, not a context "
6307 "in which the choices about what culture is available to people and how they "
6308 "get access to it are made by the few despite the wishes of the many."
6311 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6312 #: freeculture.xml:4802
6314 "At least, this was the rule in a world where the Parliament is antimonopoly, "
6315 "resistant to the protectionist pleas of publishers. In a world where the "
6316 "Parliament is more pliant, free culture would be less protected."
6319 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
6320 #: freeculture.xml:4810
6321 msgid "CHAPTER SEVEN: Recorders"
6324 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6325 #: freeculture.xml:4812
6327 "Jon Else is a filmmaker. He is best known for his documentaries and has been "
6328 "very successful in spreading his art. He is also a teacher, and as a teacher "
6329 "myself, I envy the loyalty and admiration that his students feel for him. (I "
6330 "met, by accident, two of his students at a dinner party. He was their god.)"
6333 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6334 #: freeculture.xml:4819
6336 "Else worked on a documentary that I was involved in. At a break, he told me "
6337 "a story about the freedom to create with film in America today."
6340 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
6341 #: freeculture.xml:4830 freeculture.xml:4899
6342 msgid "San Francisco Opera"
6345 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6346 #: freeculture.xml:4824
6348 "In 1990, Else was working on a documentary about Wagner's Ring Cycle. The "
6349 "focus was stagehands at the San Francisco Opera. Stagehands are a "
6350 "particularly funny and colorful element of an opera. During a show, they "
6351 "hang out below the stage in the grips' lounge and in the lighting loft. They "
6352 "make a perfect contrast to the art on the stage. <placeholder "
6353 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
6357 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6358 #: freeculture.xml:4833
6360 "During one of the performances, Else was shooting some stagehands playing "
6361 "checkers. In one corner of the room was a television set. Playing on the "
6362 "television set, while the stagehands played checkers and the opera company "
6363 "played Wagner, was <citetitle>The Simpsons</citetitle>. As Else judged it, "
6364 "this touch of cartoon helped capture the flavor of what was special about "
6368 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6369 #: freeculture.xml:4842
6371 "Years later, when he finally got funding to complete the film, Else "
6372 "attempted to clear the rights for those few seconds of <citetitle>The "
6373 "Simpsons</citetitle>. For of course, those few seconds are copyrighted; and "
6374 "of course, to use copyrighted material you need the permission of the "
6375 "copyright owner, unless \"fair use\" or some other privilege applies."
6378 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
6379 #: freeculture.xml:4854 freeculture.xml:4862
6380 msgid "Gracie Films"
6383 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6384 #: freeculture.xml:4849
6386 "Else called <citetitle>Simpsons</citetitle> creator Matt Groening's office "
6387 "to get permission. Groening approved the shot. The shot was a "
6388 "four-and-a-halfsecond image on a tiny television set in the corner of the "
6389 "room. How could it hurt? Groening was happy to have it in the film, but he "
6390 "told Else to contact Gracie Films, the company that produces the program. "
6391 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
6394 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6395 #: freeculture.xml:4857
6397 "Gracie Films was okay with it, too, but they, like Groening, wanted to be "
6398 "careful. So they told Else to contact Fox, Gracie's parent company. Else "
6399 "called Fox and told them about the clip in the corner of the one room shot "
6400 "of the film. Matt Groening had already given permission, Else said. He was "
6401 "just confirming the permission with Fox. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
6405 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6406 #: freeculture.xml:4865
6408 "Then, as Else told me, \"two things happened. First we discovered . . . that "
6409 "Matt Groening doesn't own his own creation—or at least that someone "
6410 "[at Fox] believes he doesn't own his own creation.\" And second, Fox "
6411 "\"wanted ten thousand dollars as a licensing fee for us to use this "
6412 "four-point-five seconds of . . . entirely unsolicited "
6413 "<citetitle>Simpsons</citetitle> which was in the corner of the shot.\""
6416 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6417 #: freeculture.xml:4873
6419 "Else was certain there was a mistake. He worked his way up to someone he "
6420 "thought was a vice president for licensing, Rebecca Herrera. He explained "
6421 "to her, \"There must be some mistake here. . . . We're asking for your "
6422 "educational rate on this.\" That was the educational rate, Herrera told "
6423 "Else. A day or so later, Else called again to confirm what he had been told."
6427 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6428 #: freeculture.xml:4881
6430 "\"I wanted to make sure I had my facts straight,\" he told me. \"Yes, you "
6431 "have your facts straight,\" she said. It would cost $10,000 to use the clip "
6432 "of <citetitle>The Simpsons</citetitle> in the corner of a shot in a "
6433 "documentary film about Wagner's Ring Cycle. And then, astonishingly, Herrera "
6434 "told Else, \"And if you quote me, I'll turn you over to our attorneys.\" As "
6435 "an assistant to Herrera told Else later on, \"They don't give a shit. They "
6436 "just want the money.\""
6439 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
6440 #: freeculture.xml:4900
6441 msgid "Day After Trinity, The"
6444 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6445 #: freeculture.xml:4893
6447 "Else didn't have the money to buy the right to replay what was playing on "
6448 "the television backstage at the San Francisco Opera. To reproduce this "
6449 "reality was beyond the documentary filmmaker's budget. At the very last "
6450 "minute before the film was to be released, Else digitally replaced the shot "
6451 "with a clip from another film that he had worked on, <citetitle>The Day "
6452 "After Trinity</citetitle>, from ten years before. <placeholder "
6453 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
6456 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6457 #: freeculture.xml:4903
6459 "There's no doubt that someone, whether Matt Groening or Fox, owns the "
6460 "copyright to <citetitle>The Simpsons</citetitle>. That copyright is their "
6461 "property. To use that copyrighted material thus sometimes requires the "
6462 "permission of the copyright owner. If the use that Else wanted to make of "
6463 "the <citetitle>Simpsons</citetitle> copyright were one of the uses "
6464 "restricted by the law, then he would need to get the permission of the "
6465 "copyright owner before he could use the work in that way. And in a free "
6466 "market, it is the owner of the copyright who gets to set the price for any "
6467 "use that the law says the owner gets to control."
6470 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6471 #: freeculture.xml:4914
6473 "For example, \"public performance\" is a use of <citetitle>The "
6474 "Simpsons</citetitle> that the copyright owner gets to control. If you take a "
6475 "selection of favorite episodes, rent a movie theater, and charge for tickets "
6476 "to come see \"My Favorite <citetitle>Simpsons</citetitle>,\" then you need "
6477 "to get permission from the copyright owner. And the copyright owner "
6478 "(rightly, in my view) can charge whatever she wants—$10 or "
6479 "$1,000,000. That's her right, as set by the law."
6483 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
6484 #: freeculture.xml:4926
6486 "For an excellent argument that such use is \"fair use,\" but that lawyers "
6487 "don't permit recognition that it is \"fair use,\" see Richard A. Posner with "
6488 "William F. Patry, \"Fair Use and Statutory Reform in the Wake of "
6489 "<citetitle>Eldred</citetitle>\" (draft on file with author), University of "
6490 "Chicago Law School, 5 August 2003."
6493 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6494 #: freeculture.xml:4923
6496 "But when lawyers hear this story about Jon Else and Fox, their first thought "
6497 "is \"fair use.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Else's use of just "
6498 "4.5 seconds of an indirect shot of a <citetitle>Simpsons</citetitle> episode "
6499 "is clearly a fair use of <citetitle>The Simpsons</citetitle>—and fair "
6500 "use does not require the permission of anyone."
6504 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6505 #: freeculture.xml:4938
6506 msgid "So I asked Else why he didn't just rely upon \"fair use.\" Here's his reply:"
6509 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
6510 #: freeculture.xml:4942
6512 "The <citetitle>Simpsons</citetitle> fiasco was for me a great lesson in the "
6513 "gulf between what lawyers find irrelevant in some abstract sense, and what "
6514 "is crushingly relevant in practice to those of us actually trying to make "
6515 "and broadcast documentaries. I never had any doubt that it was \"clearly "
6516 "fair use\" in an absolute legal sense. But I couldn't rely on the concept in "
6517 "any concrete way. Here's why:"
6521 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><orderedlist><listitem><para>
6522 #: freeculture.xml:4952
6524 "Before our films can be broadcast, the network requires that we buy Errors "
6525 "and Omissions insurance. The carriers require a detailed \"visual cue "
6526 "sheet\" listing the source and licensing status of each shot in the "
6527 "film. They take a dim view of \"fair use,\" and a claim of \"fair use\" can "
6528 "grind the application process to a halt."
6531 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><orderedlist><listitem><para><indexterm><primary>
6532 #: freeculture.xml:4969
6533 msgid "Lucas, George"
6536 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><orderedlist><listitem><para>
6537 #: freeculture.xml:4960
6539 "I probably never should have asked Matt Groening in the first place. But I "
6540 "knew (at least from folklore) that Fox had a history of tracking down and "
6541 "stopping unlicensed <citetitle>Simpsons</citetitle> usage, just as George "
6542 "Lucas had a very high profile litigating <citetitle>Star Wars</citetitle> "
6543 "usage. So I decided to play by the book, thinking that we would be granted "
6544 "free or cheap license to four seconds of <citetitle>Simpsons</citetitle>. As "
6545 "a documentary producer working to exhaustion on a shoestring, the last thing "
6546 "I wanted was to risk legal trouble, even nuisance legal trouble, and even to "
6547 "defend a principle. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
6552 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><orderedlist><listitem><para>
6553 #: freeculture.xml:4973
6555 "I did, in fact, speak with one of your colleagues at Stanford Law School "
6556 ". . . who confirmed that it was fair use. He also confirmed that Fox would "
6557 "\"depose and litigate you to within an inch of your life,\" regardless of "
6558 "the merits of my claim. He made clear that it would boil down to who had the "
6559 "bigger legal department and the deeper pockets, me or them."
6563 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><orderedlist><listitem><para>
6564 #: freeculture.xml:4983
6566 "The question of fair use usually comes up at the end of the project, when we "
6567 "are up against a release deadline and out of money."
6570 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6571 #: freeculture.xml:4990
6573 "In theory, fair use means you need no permission. The theory therefore "
6574 "supports free culture and insulates against a permission culture. But in "
6575 "practice, fair use functions very differently. The fuzzy lines of the law, "
6576 "tied to the extraordinary liability if lines are crossed, means that the "
6577 "effective fair use for many types of creators is slight. The law has the "
6578 "right aim; practice has defeated the aim."
6581 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6582 #: freeculture.xml:4998
6584 "This practice shows just how far the law has come from its "
6585 "eighteenth-century roots. The law was born as a shield to protect "
6586 "publishers' profits against the unfair competition of a pirate. It has "
6587 "matured into a sword that interferes with any use, transformative or not."
6590 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
6591 #: freeculture.xml:5007
6592 msgid "CHAPTER EIGHT: Transformers"
6595 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
6596 #: freeculture.xml:5008
6600 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
6601 #: freeculture.xml:5009 freeculture.xml:5017 freeculture.xml:5028 freeculture.xml:5043 freeculture.xml:5052 freeculture.xml:5057 freeculture.xml:5109 freeculture.xml:5125 freeculture.xml:5148 freeculture.xml:5211 freeculture.xml:9574
6605 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6606 #: freeculture.xml:5011
6608 "In 1993, Alex Alben was a lawyer working at Starwave, Inc. Starwave was an "
6609 "innovative company founded by Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen to develop "
6610 "digital entertainment. Long before the Internet became popular, Starwave "
6611 "began investing in new technology for delivering entertainment in "
6612 "anticipation of the power of networks."
6615 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6616 #: freeculture.xml:5019
6618 "Alben had a special interest in new technology. He was intrigued by the "
6619 "emerging market for CD-ROM technology—not to distribute film, but to "
6620 "do things with film that otherwise would be very difficult. In 1993, he "
6621 "launched an initiative to develop a product to build retrospectives on the "
6622 "work of particular actors. The first actor chosen was Clint Eastwood. The "
6623 "idea was to showcase all of the work of Eastwood, with clips from his films "
6624 "and interviews with figures important to his career."
6627 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6628 #: freeculture.xml:5030
6630 "At that time, Eastwood had made more than fifty films, as an actor and as a "
6631 "director. Alben began with a series of interviews with Eastwood, asking him "
6632 "about his career. Because Starwave produced those interviews, it was free to "
6633 "include them on the CD."
6637 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6638 #: freeculture.xml:5037
6640 "That alone would not have made a very interesting product, so Starwave "
6641 "wanted to add content from the movies in Eastwood's career: posters, "
6642 "scripts, and other material relating to the films Eastwood made. Most of his "
6643 "career was spent at Warner Brothers, and so it was relatively easy to get "
6644 "permission for that content."
6647 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6648 #: freeculture.xml:5045
6650 "Then Alben and his team decided to include actual film clips. \"Our goal was "
6651 "that we were going to have a clip from every one of Eastwood's films,\" "
6652 "Alben told me. It was here that the problem arose. \"No one had ever really "
6653 "done this before,\" Alben explained. \"No one had ever tried to do this in "
6654 "the context of an artistic look at an actor's career.\""
6657 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6658 #: freeculture.xml:5054
6660 "Alben brought the idea to Michael Slade, the CEO of Starwave. Slade asked, "
6661 "\"Well, what will it take?\""
6664 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
6665 #: freeculture.xml:5070
6669 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para><indexterm><secondary>
6670 #: freeculture.xml:5071
6671 msgid "publicity rights on images of"
6674 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
6675 #: freeculture.xml:5065
6677 "Technically, the rights that Alben had to clear were mainly those of "
6678 "publicity—rights an artist has to control the commercial exploitation "
6679 "of his image. But these rights, too, burden \"Rip, Mix, Burn\" creativity, "
6680 "as this chapter evinces. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
6683 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6684 #: freeculture.xml:5059
6686 "Alben replied, \"Well, we're going to have to clear rights from everyone who "
6687 "appears in these films, and the music and everything else that we want to "
6688 "use in these film clips.\" Slade said, \"Great! Go for it.\"<placeholder "
6689 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
6692 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6693 #: freeculture.xml:5076
6695 "The problem was that neither Alben nor Slade had any idea what clearing "
6696 "those rights would mean. Every actor in each of the films could have a claim "
6697 "to royalties for the reuse of that film. But CD- ROMs had not been specified "
6698 "in the contracts for the actors, so there was no clear way to know just what "
6699 "Starwave was to do."
6702 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6703 #: freeculture.xml:5083
6705 "I asked Alben how he dealt with the problem. With an obvious pride in his "
6706 "resourcefulness that obscured the obvious bizarreness of his tale, Alben "
6707 "recounted just what they did:"
6710 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
6711 #: freeculture.xml:5089
6713 "So we very mechanically went about looking up the film clips. We made some "
6714 "artistic decisions about what film clips to include—of course we were "
6715 "going to use the \"Make my day\" clip from <citetitle>Dirty "
6716 "Harry</citetitle>. But you then need to get the guy on the ground who's "
6717 "wiggling under the gun and you need to get his permission. And then you "
6718 "have to decide what you are going to pay him."
6722 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
6723 #: freeculture.xml:5098
6725 "We decided that it would be fair if we offered them the dayplayer rate for "
6726 "the right to reuse that performance. We're talking about a clip of less than "
6727 "a minute, but to reuse that performance in the CD-ROM the rate at the time "
6728 "was about $600. So we had to identify the people—some of them were "
6729 "hard to identify because in Eastwood movies you can't tell who's the guy "
6730 "crashing through the glass—is it the actor or is it the stuntman? And "
6731 "then we just, we put together a team, my assistant and some others, and we "
6732 "just started calling people."
6735 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6736 #: freeculture.xml:5111
6738 "Some actors were glad to help—Donald Sutherland, for example, followed "
6739 "up himself to be sure that the rights had been cleared. Others were "
6740 "dumbfounded at their good fortune. Alben would ask, \"Hey, can I pay you "
6741 "$600 or maybe if you were in two films, you know, $1,200?\" And they would "
6742 "say, \"Are you for real? Hey, I'd love to get $1,200.\" And some of course "
6743 "were a bit difficult (estranged ex-wives, in particular). But eventually, "
6744 "Alben and his team had cleared the rights to this retrospective CD-ROM on "
6745 "Clint Eastwood's career."
6748 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6749 #: freeculture.xml:5122
6751 "It was one <emphasis>year</emphasis> later—\"and even then we weren't "
6752 "sure whether we were totally in the clear.\""
6755 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6756 #: freeculture.xml:5127
6758 "Alben is proud of his work. The project was the first of its kind and the "
6759 "only time he knew of that a team had undertaken such a massive project for "
6760 "the purpose of releasing a retrospective."
6763 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
6764 #: freeculture.xml:5133
6766 "Everyone thought it would be too hard. Everyone just threw up their hands "
6767 "and said, \"Oh, my gosh, a film, it's so many copyrights, there's the music, "
6768 "there's the screenplay, there's the director, there's the actors.\" But we "
6769 "just broke it down. We just put it into its constituent parts and said, "
6770 "\"Okay, there's this many actors, this many directors, . . . this many "
6771 "musicians,\" and we just went at it very systematically and cleared the "
6776 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6777 #: freeculture.xml:5145
6779 "And no doubt, the product itself was exceptionally good. Eastwood loved it, "
6780 "and it sold very well."
6783 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
6784 #: freeculture.xml:5149
6785 msgid "Drucker, Peter"
6789 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
6790 #: freeculture.xml:5157
6792 "U.S. Department of Commerce Office of Acquisition Management, "
6793 "<citetitle>Seven Steps to Performance-Based Services "
6794 "Acquisition</citetitle>, available at <ulink "
6795 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #22</ulink>."
6798 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6799 #: freeculture.xml:5151
6801 "But I pressed Alben about how weird it seems that it would have to take a "
6802 "year's work simply to clear rights. No doubt Alben had done this "
6803 "efficiently, but as Peter Drucker has famously quipped, \"There is nothing "
6804 "so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at "
6805 "all.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Did it make sense, I asked "
6806 "Alben, that this is the way a new work has to be made?"
6809 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6810 #: freeculture.xml:5165
6812 "For, as he acknowledged, \"very few . . . have the time and resources, and "
6813 "the will to do this,\" and thus, very few such works would ever be "
6814 "made. Does it make sense, I asked him, from the standpoint of what anybody "
6815 "really thought they were ever giving rights for originally, that you would "
6816 "have to go clear rights for these kinds of clips?"
6819 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
6820 #: freeculture.xml:5173
6822 "I don't think so. When an actor renders a performance in a movie, he or she "
6823 "gets paid very well. . . . And then when 30 seconds of that performance is "
6824 "used in a new product that is a retrospective of somebody's career, I don't "
6825 "think that that person . . . should be compensated for that."
6828 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6829 #: freeculture.xml:5181
6831 "Or at least, is this <emphasis>how</emphasis> the artist should be "
6832 "compensated? Would it make sense, I asked, for there to be some kind of "
6833 "statutory license that someone could pay and be free to make derivative use "
6834 "of clips like this? Did it really make sense that a follow-on creator would "
6835 "have to track down every artist, actor, director, musician, and get explicit "
6836 "permission from each? Wouldn't a lot more be created if the legal part of "
6837 "the creative process could be made to be more clean?"
6841 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
6842 #: freeculture.xml:5192
6844 "Absolutely. I think that if there were some fair-licensing "
6845 "mechanism—where you weren't subject to hold-ups and you weren't "
6846 "subject to estranged former spouses—you'd see a lot more of this work, "
6847 "because it wouldn't be so daunting to try to put together a retrospective of "
6848 "someone's career and meaningfully illustrate it with lots of media from that "
6849 "person's career. You'd build in a cost as the producer of one of these "
6850 "things. You'd build in a cost of paying X dollars to the talent that "
6851 "performed. But it would be a known cost. That's the thing that trips "
6852 "everybody up and makes this kind of product hard to get off the ground. If "
6853 "you knew I have a hundred minutes of film in this product and it's going to "
6854 "cost me X, then you build your budget around it, and you can get investments "
6855 "and everything else that you need to produce it. But if you say, \"Oh, I "
6856 "want a hundred minutes of something and I have no idea what it's going to "
6857 "cost me, and a certain number of people are going to hold me up for money,\" "
6858 "then it becomes difficult to put one of these things together."
6861 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6862 #: freeculture.xml:5213
6864 "Alben worked for a big company. His company was backed by some of the "
6865 "richest investors in the world. He therefore had authority and access that "
6866 "the average Web designer would not have. So if it took him a year, how long "
6867 "would it take someone else? And how much creativity is never made just "
6868 "because the costs of clearing the rights are so high? These costs are the "
6869 "burdens of a kind of regulation. Put on a Republican hat for a moment, and "
6870 "get angry for a bit. The government defines the scope of these rights, and "
6871 "the scope defined determines how much it's going to cost to negotiate "
6872 "them. (Remember the idea that land runs to the heavens, and imagine the "
6873 "pilot purchasing flythrough rights as he negotiates to fly from Los Angeles "
6874 "to San Francisco.) These rights might well have once made sense; but as "
6875 "circumstances change, they make no sense at all. Or at least, a "
6876 "well-trained, regulationminimizing Republican should look at the rights and "
6877 "ask, \"Does this still make sense?\""
6881 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6882 #: freeculture.xml:5230
6884 "I've seen the flash of recognition when people get this point, but only a "
6885 "few times. The first was at a conference of federal judges in California. "
6886 "The judges were gathered to discuss the emerging topic of cyber-law. I was "
6887 "asked to be on the panel. Harvey Saferstein, a well-respected lawyer from an "
6888 "L.A. firm, introduced the panel with a video that he and a friend, Robert "
6889 "Fairbank, had produced."
6892 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6893 #: freeculture.xml:5240
6895 "The video was a brilliant collage of film from every period in the twentieth "
6896 "century, all framed around the idea of a <citetitle>60 Minutes</citetitle> "
6897 "episode. The execution was perfect, down to the sixty-minute stopwatch. The "
6898 "judges loved every minute of it."
6901 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
6902 #: freeculture.xml:5245
6903 msgid "Nimmer, David"
6906 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6907 #: freeculture.xml:5247
6909 "When the lights came up, I looked over to my copanelist, David Nimmer, "
6910 "perhaps the leading copyright scholar and practitioner in the nation. He had "
6911 "an astonished look on his face, as he peered across the room of over 250 "
6912 "well-entertained judges. Taking an ominous tone, he began his talk with a "
6913 "question: \"Do you know how many federal laws were just violated in this "
6917 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
6918 #: freeculture.xml:5254
6919 msgid "Boies, David"
6922 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6923 #: freeculture.xml:5256
6925 "For of course, the two brilliantly talented creators who made this film "
6926 "hadn't done what Alben did. They hadn't spent a year clearing the rights to "
6927 "these clips; technically, what they had done violated the law. Of course, "
6928 "it wasn't as if they or anyone were going to be prosecuted for this "
6929 "violation (the presence of 250 judges and a gaggle of federal marshals "
6930 "notwithstanding). But Nimmer was making an important point: A year before "
6931 "anyone would have heard of the word Napster, and two years before another "
6932 "member of our panel, David Boies, would defend Napster before the Ninth "
6933 "Circuit Court of Appeals, Nimmer was trying to get the judges to see that "
6934 "the law would not be friendly to the capacities that this technology would "
6935 "enable. Technology means you can now do amazing things easily; but you "
6936 "couldn't easily do them legally."
6939 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6940 #: freeculture.xml:5271
6942 "We live in a \"cut and paste\" culture enabled by technology. Anyone "
6943 "building a presentation knows the extraordinary freedom that the cut and "
6944 "paste architecture of the Internet created—in a second you can find "
6945 "just about any image you want; in another second, you can have it planted in "
6946 "your presentation."
6949 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
6950 #: freeculture.xml:5287
6954 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6955 #: freeculture.xml:5278
6957 "But presentations are just a tiny beginning. Using the Internet and its "
6958 "archives, musicians are able to string together mixes of sound never before "
6959 "imagined; filmmakers are able to build movies out of clips on computers "
6960 "around the world. An extraordinary site in Sweden takes images of "
6961 "politicians and blends them with music to create biting political "
6962 "commentary. A site called Camp Chaos has produced some of the most biting "
6963 "criticism of the record industry that there is through the mixing of Flash! "
6964 "and music. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
6967 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6968 #: freeculture.xml:5290
6970 "All of these creations are technically illegal. Even if the creators wanted "
6971 "to be \"legal,\" the cost of complying with the law is impossibly "
6972 "high. Therefore, for the law-abiding sorts, a wealth of creativity is never "
6973 "made. And for that part that is made, if it doesn't follow the clearance "
6974 "rules, it doesn't get released."
6977 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6978 #: freeculture.xml:5297
6980 "To some, these stories suggest a solution: Let's alter the mix of rights so "
6981 "that people are free to build upon our culture. Free to add or mix as they "
6982 "see fit. We could even make this change without necessarily requiring that "
6983 "the \"free\" use be free as in \"free beer.\" Instead, the system could "
6984 "simply make it easy for follow-on creators to compensate artists without "
6985 "requiring an army of lawyers to come along: a rule, for example, that says "
6986 "\"the royalty owed the copyright owner of an unregistered work for the "
6987 "derivative reuse of his work will be a flat 1 percent of net revenues, to be "
6988 "held in escrow for the copyright owner.\" Under this rule, the copyright "
6989 "owner could benefit from some royalty, but he would not have the benefit of "
6990 "a full property right (meaning the right to name his own price) unless he "
6991 "registers the work."
6994 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
6995 #: freeculture.xml:5312
6997 "Who could possibly object to this? And what reason would there be for "
6998 "objecting? We're talking about work that is not now being made; which if "
6999 "made, under this plan, would produce new income for artists. What reason "
7000 "would anyone have to oppose it?"
7004 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7005 #: freeculture.xml:5318
7007 "In February 2003, DreamWorks studios announced an agreement with Mike Myers, "
7008 "the comic genius of <citetitle>Saturday Night Live</citetitle> and Austin "
7009 "Powers. According to the announcement, Myers and Dream-Works would work "
7010 "together to form a \"unique filmmaking pact.\" Under the agreement, "
7011 "DreamWorks \"will acquire the rights to existing motion picture hits and "
7012 "classics, write new storylines and—with the use of stateof-the-art "
7013 "digital technology—insert Myers and other actors into the film, "
7014 "thereby creating an entirely new piece of entertainment.\""
7017 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7018 #: freeculture.xml:5330
7020 "The announcement called this \"film sampling.\" As Myers explained, \"Film "
7021 "Sampling is an exciting way to put an original spin on existing films and "
7022 "allow audiences to see old movies in a new light. Rap artists have been "
7023 "doing this for years with music and now we are able to take that same "
7024 "concept and apply it to film.\" Steven Spielberg is quoted as saying, \"If "
7025 "anyone can create a way to bring old films to new audiences, it is Mike.\""
7028 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7029 #: freeculture.xml:5339
7031 "Spielberg is right. Film sampling by Myers will be brilliant. But if you "
7032 "don't think about it, you might miss the truly astonishing point about this "
7033 "announcement. As the vast majority of our film heritage remains under "
7034 "copyright, the real meaning of the DreamWorks announcement is just this: It "
7035 "is Mike Myers and only Mike Myers who is free to sample. Any general freedom "
7036 "to build upon the film archive of our culture, a freedom in other contexts "
7037 "presumed for us all, is now a privilege reserved for the funny and "
7038 "famous—and presumably rich."
7041 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7042 #: freeculture.xml:5349
7044 "This privilege becomes reserved for two sorts of reasons. The first "
7045 "continues the story of the last chapter: the vagueness of \"fair use.\" Much "
7046 "of \"sampling\" should be considered \"fair use.\" But few would rely upon "
7047 "so weak a doctrine to create. That leads to the second reason that the "
7048 "privilege is reserved for the few: The costs of negotiating the legal rights "
7049 "for the creative reuse of content are astronomically high. These costs "
7050 "mirror the costs with fair use: You either pay a lawyer to defend your fair "
7051 "use rights or pay a lawyer to track down permissions so you don't have to "
7052 "rely upon fair use rights. Either way, the creative process is a process of "
7053 "paying lawyers—again a privilege, or perhaps a curse, reserved for the "
7057 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
7058 #: freeculture.xml:5364
7059 msgid "CHAPTER NINE: Collectors"
7062 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7063 #: freeculture.xml:5366
7065 "In April 1996, millions of \"bots\"—computer codes designed to "
7066 "\"spider,\" or automatically search the Internet and copy "
7067 "content—began running across the Net. Page by page, these bots copied "
7068 "Internet-based information onto a small set of computers located in a "
7069 "basement in San Francisco's Presidio. Once the bots finished the whole of "
7070 "the Internet, they started again. Over and over again, once every two "
7071 "months, these bits of code took copies of the Internet and stored them."
7074 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7075 #: freeculture.xml:5375
7077 "By October 2001, the bots had collected more than five years of copies. And "
7078 "at a small announcement in Berkeley, California, the archive that these "
7079 "copies created, the Internet Archive, was opened to the world. Using a "
7080 "technology called \"the Way Back Machine,\" you could enter a Web page, and "
7081 "see all of its copies going back to 1996, as well as when those pages "
7085 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7086 #: freeculture.xml:5383
7088 "This is the thing about the Internet that Orwell would have appreciated. In "
7089 "the dystopia described in <citetitle>1984</citetitle>, old newspapers were "
7090 "constantly updated to assure that the current view of the world, approved of "
7091 "by the government, was not contradicted by previous news reports."
7095 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7096 #: freeculture.xml:5391
7098 "Thousands of workers constantly reedited the past, meaning there was no way "
7099 "ever to know whether the story you were reading today was the story that was "
7100 "printed on the date published on the paper."
7103 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7104 #: freeculture.xml:5396
7106 "It's the same with the Internet. If you go to a Web page today, there's no "
7107 "way for you to know whether the content you are reading is the same as the "
7108 "content you read before. The page may seem the same, but the content could "
7109 "easily be different. The Internet is Orwell's library—constantly "
7110 "updated, without any reliable memory."
7114 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
7115 #: freeculture.xml:5409
7117 "The temptations remain, however. Brewster Kahle reports that the White House "
7118 "changes its own press releases without notice. A May 13, 2003, press release "
7119 "stated, \"Combat Operations in Iraq Have Ended.\" That was later changed, "
7120 "without notice, to \"Major Combat Operations in Iraq Have Ended.\" E-mail "
7121 "from Brewster Kahle, 1 December 2003."
7124 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7125 #: freeculture.xml:5403
7127 "Until the Way Back Machine, at least. With the Way Back Machine, and the "
7128 "Internet Archive underlying it, you can see what the Internet was. You have "
7129 "the power to see what you remember. More importantly, perhaps, you also have "
7130 "the power to find what you don't remember and what others might prefer you "
7131 "forget.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
7134 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7135 #: freeculture.xml:5417
7137 "We take it for granted that we can go back to see what we remember "
7138 "reading. Think about newspapers. If you wanted to study the reaction of your "
7139 "hometown newspaper to the race riots in Watts in 1965, or to Bull Connor's "
7140 "water cannon in 1963, you could go to your public library and look at the "
7141 "newspapers. Those papers probably exist on microfiche. If you're lucky, they "
7142 "exist in paper, too. Either way, you are free, using a library, to go back "
7143 "and remember—not just what it is convenient to remember, but remember "
7144 "something close to the truth."
7147 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7148 #: freeculture.xml:5428
7150 "It is said that those who fail to remember history are doomed to repeat "
7151 "it. That's not quite correct. We <emphasis>all</emphasis> forget "
7152 "history. The key is whether we have a way to go back to rediscover what we "
7153 "forget. More directly, the key is whether an objective past can keep us "
7154 "honest. Libraries help do that, by collecting content and keeping it, for "
7155 "schoolchildren, for researchers, for grandma. A free society presumes this "
7160 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7161 #: freeculture.xml:5437
7163 "The Internet was an exception to this presumption. Until the Internet "
7164 "Archive, there was no way to go back. The Internet was the quintessentially "
7165 "transitory medium. And yet, as it becomes more important in forming and "
7166 "reforming society, it becomes more and more important to maintain in some "
7167 "historical form. It's just bizarre to think that we have scads of archives "
7168 "of newspapers from tiny towns around the world, yet there is but one copy of "
7169 "the Internet—the one kept by the Internet Archive."
7172 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7173 #: freeculture.xml:5448
7175 "Brewster Kahle is the founder of the Internet Archive. He was a very "
7176 "successful Internet entrepreneur after he was a successful computer "
7177 "researcher. In the 1990s, Kahle decided he had had enough business "
7178 "success. It was time to become a different kind of success. So he launched "
7179 "a series of projects designed to archive human knowledge. The Internet "
7180 "Archive was just the first of the projects of this Andrew Carnegie of the "
7181 "Internet. By December of 2002, the archive had over 10 billion pages, and it "
7182 "was growing at about a billion pages a month."
7185 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7186 #: freeculture.xml:5458
7188 "The Way Back Machine is the largest archive of human knowledge in human "
7189 "history. At the end of 2002, it held \"two hundred and thirty terabytes of "
7190 "material\"—and was \"ten times larger than the Library of Congress.\" "
7191 "And this was just the first of the archives that Kahle set out to build. In "
7192 "addition to the Internet Archive, Kahle has been constructing the Television "
7193 "Archive. Television, it turns out, is even more ephemeral than the "
7194 "Internet. While much of twentieth-century culture was constructed through "
7195 "television, only a tiny proportion of that culture is available for anyone "
7196 "to see today. Three hours of news are recorded each evening by Vanderbilt "
7197 "University—thanks to a specific exemption in the copyright law. That "
7198 "content is indexed, and is available to scholars for a very low fee. \"But "
7199 "other than that, [television] is almost unavailable,\" Kahle told me. \"If "
7200 "you were Barbara Walters you could get access to [the archives], but if you "
7201 "are just a graduate student?\" As Kahle put it,"
7205 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
7206 #: freeculture.xml:5476
7208 "Do you remember when Dan Quayle was interacting with Murphy Brown? Remember "
7209 "that back and forth surreal experience of a politician interacting with a "
7210 "fictional television character? If you were a graduate student wanting to "
7211 "study that, and you wanted to get those original back and forth exchanges "
7212 "between the two, the <citetitle>60 Minutes</citetitle> episode that came out "
7213 "after it . . . it would be almost impossible. . . . Those materials are "
7214 "almost unfindable. . . ."
7217 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7218 #: freeculture.xml:5488
7220 "Why is that? Why is it that the part of our culture that is recorded in "
7221 "newspapers remains perpetually accessible, while the part that is recorded "
7222 "on videotape is not? How is it that we've created a world where researchers "
7223 "trying to understand the effect of media on nineteenthcentury America will "
7224 "have an easier time than researchers trying to understand the effect of "
7225 "media on twentieth-century America?"
7228 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7229 #: freeculture.xml:5496
7231 "In part, this is because of the law. Early in American copyright law, "
7232 "copyright owners were required to deposit copies of their work in "
7233 "libraries. These copies were intended both to facilitate the spread of "
7234 "knowledge and to assure that a copy of the work would be around once the "
7235 "copyright expired, so that others might access and copy the work."
7239 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
7240 #: freeculture.xml:5513
7242 "Doug Herrick, \"Toward a National Film Collection: Motion Pictures at the "
7243 "Library of Congress,\" <citetitle>Film Library Quarterly</citetitle> 13 "
7244 "nos. 2–3 (1980): 5; Anthony Slide, <citetitle>Nitrate Won't Wait: A "
7245 "History of Film Preservation in the United States</citetitle> ( Jefferson, "
7246 "N.C.: McFarland & Co., 1992), 36."
7249 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7250 #: freeculture.xml:5504
7252 "These rules applied to film as well. But in 1915, the Library of Congress "
7253 "made an exception for film. Film could be copyrighted so long as such "
7254 "deposits were made. But the filmmaker was then allowed to borrow back the "
7255 "deposits—for an unlimited time at no cost. In 1915 alone, there were "
7256 "more than 5,475 films deposited and \"borrowed back.\" Thus, when the "
7257 "copyrights to films expire, there is no copy held by any library. The copy "
7258 "exists—if it exists at all—in the library archive of the film "
7259 "company.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
7262 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7263 #: freeculture.xml:5521
7265 "The same is generally true about television. Television broadcasts were "
7266 "originally not copyrighted—there was no way to capture the broadcasts, "
7267 "so there was no fear of \"theft.\" But as technology enabled capturing, "
7268 "broadcasters relied increasingly upon the law. The law required they make a "
7269 "copy of each broadcast for the work to be \"copyrighted.\" But those copies "
7270 "were simply kept by the broadcasters. No library had any right to them; the "
7271 "government didn't demand them. The content of this part of American culture "
7272 "is practically invisible to anyone who would look."
7276 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7277 #: freeculture.xml:5532
7279 "Kahle was eager to correct this. Before September 11, 2001, he and his "
7280 "allies had started capturing television. They selected twenty stations from "
7281 "around the world and hit the Record button. After September 11, Kahle, "
7282 "working with dozens of others, selected twenty stations from around the "
7283 "world and, beginning October 11, 2001, made their coverage during the week "
7284 "of September 11 available free on-line. Anyone could see how news reports "
7285 "from around the world covered the events of that day."
7288 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
7289 #: freeculture.xml:5559
7290 msgid "Movie Archive"
7293 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7294 #: freeculture.xml:5543
7296 "Kahle had the same idea with film. Working with Rick Prelinger, whose "
7297 "archive of film includes close to 45,000 \"ephemeral films\" (meaning films "
7298 "other than Hollywood movies, films that were never copyrighted), Kahle "
7299 "established the Movie Archive. Prelinger let Kahle digitize 1,300 films in "
7300 "this archive and post those films on the Internet to be downloaded for "
7301 "free. Prelinger's is a for-profit company. It sells copies of these films as "
7302 "stock footage. What he has discovered is that after he made a significant "
7303 "chunk available for free, his stock footage sales went up "
7304 "dramatically. People could easily find the material they wanted to use. Some "
7305 "downloaded that material and made films on their own. Others purchased "
7306 "copies to enable other films to be made. Either way, the archive enabled "
7307 "access to this important part of our culture. Want to see a copy of the "
7308 "\"Duck and Cover\" film that instructed children how to save themselves in "
7309 "the middle of nuclear attack? Go to archive.org, and you can download the "
7310 "film in a few minutes—for free. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
7314 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7315 #: freeculture.xml:5562
7317 "Here again, Kahle is providing access to a part of our culture that we "
7318 "otherwise could not get easily, if at all. It is yet another part of what "
7319 "defines the twentieth century that we have lost to history. The law doesn't "
7320 "require these copies to be kept by anyone, or to be deposited in an archive "
7321 "by anyone. Therefore, there is no simple way to find them."
7324 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7325 #: freeculture.xml:5570
7327 "The key here is access, not price. Kahle wants to enable free access to this "
7328 "content, but he also wants to enable others to sell access to it. His aim is "
7329 "to ensure competition in access to this important part of our culture. Not "
7330 "during the commercial life of a bit of creative property, but during a "
7331 "second life that all creative property has—a noncommercial life."
7335 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7336 #: freeculture.xml:5578
7338 "For here is an idea that we should more clearly recognize. Every bit of "
7339 "creative property goes through different \"lives.\" In its first life, if "
7340 "the creator is lucky, the content is sold. In such cases the commercial "
7341 "market is successful for the creator. The vast majority of creative property "
7342 "doesn't enjoy such success, but some clearly does. For that content, "
7343 "commercial life is extremely important. Without this commercial market, "
7344 "there would be, many argue, much less creativity."
7347 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7348 #: freeculture.xml:5590
7350 "After the commercial life of creative property has ended, our tradition has "
7351 "always supported a second life as well. A newspaper delivers the news every "
7352 "day to the doorsteps of America. The very next day, it is used to wrap fish "
7353 "or to fill boxes with fragile gifts or to build an archive of knowledge "
7354 "about our history. In this second life, the content can continue to inform "
7355 "even if that information is no longer sold."
7359 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
7360 #: freeculture.xml:5602
7362 "Dave Barns, \"Fledgling Career in Antique Books: Woodstock Landlord, Bar "
7363 "Owner Starts a New Chapter by Adopting Business,\" <citetitle>Chicago "
7364 "Tribune</citetitle>, 5 September 1997, at Metro Lake 1L. Of books published "
7365 "between 1927 and 1946, only 2.2 percent were in print in 2002. R. Anthony "
7366 "Reese, \"The First Sale Doctrine in the Era of Digital Networks,\" "
7367 "<citetitle>Boston College Law Review</citetitle> 44 (2003): 593 n. 51."
7370 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7371 #: freeculture.xml:5599
7373 "The same has always been true about books. A book goes out of print very "
7374 "quickly (the average today is after about a year<placeholder "
7375 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>). After it is out of print, it can be sold in "
7376 "used book stores without the copyright owner getting anything and stored in "
7377 "libraries, where many get to read the book, also for free. Used book stores "
7378 "and libraries are thus the second life of a book. That second life is "
7379 "extremely important to the spread and stability of culture."
7382 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7383 #: freeculture.xml:5616
7385 "Yet increasingly, any assumption about a stable second life for creative "
7386 "property does not hold true with the most important components of popular "
7387 "culture in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. For "
7388 "these—television, movies, music, radio, the Internet—there is no "
7389 "guarantee of a second life. For these sorts of culture, it is as if we've "
7390 "replaced libraries with Barnes & Noble superstores. With this culture, "
7391 "what's accessible is nothing but what a certain limited market demands. "
7392 "Beyond that, culture disappears."
7396 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7397 #: freeculture.xml:5627
7399 "For most of the twentieth century, it was economics that made this so. It "
7400 "would have been insanely expensive to collect and make accessible all "
7401 "television and film and music: The cost of analog copies is extraordinarily "
7402 "high. So even though the law in principle would have restricted the ability "
7403 "of a Brewster Kahle to copy culture generally, the real restriction was "
7404 "economics. The market made it impossibly difficult to do anything about this "
7405 "ephemeral culture; the law had little practical effect."
7408 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7409 #: freeculture.xml:5639
7411 "Perhaps the single most important feature of the digital revolution is that "
7412 "for the first time since the Library of Alexandria, it is feasible to "
7413 "imagine constructing archives that hold all culture produced or distributed "
7414 "publicly. Technology makes it possible to imagine an archive of all books "
7415 "published, and increasingly makes it possible to imagine an archive of all "
7416 "moving images and sound."
7419 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7420 #: freeculture.xml:5647
7422 "The scale of this potential archive is something we've never imagined "
7423 "before. The Brewster Kahles of our history have dreamed about it; but we are "
7424 "for the first time at a point where that dream is possible. As Kahle "
7428 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
7429 #: freeculture.xml:5654
7431 "It looks like there's about two to three million recordings of music. "
7432 "Ever. There are about a hundred thousand theatrical releases of movies, "
7433 ". . . and about one to two million movies [distributed] during the twentieth "
7434 "century. There are about twenty-six million different titles of books. All "
7435 "of these would fit on computers that would fit in this room and be able to "
7436 "be afforded by a small company. So we're at a turning point in our "
7437 "history. Universal access is the goal. And the opportunity of leading a "
7438 "different life, based on this, is . . . thrilling. It could be one of the "
7439 "things humankind would be most proud of. Up there with the Library of "
7440 "Alexandria, putting a man on the moon, and the invention of the printing "
7445 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7446 #: freeculture.xml:5668
7448 "Kahle is not the only librarian. The Internet Archive is not the only "
7449 "archive. But Kahle and the Internet Archive suggest what the future of "
7450 "libraries or archives could be. <emphasis>When</emphasis> the commercial "
7451 "life of creative property ends, I don't know. But it does. And whenever it "
7452 "does, Kahle and his archive hint at a world where this knowledge, and "
7453 "culture, remains perpetually available. Some will draw upon it to understand "
7454 "it; some to criticize it. Some will use it, as Walt Disney did, to re-create "
7455 "the past for the future. These technologies promise something that had "
7456 "become unimaginable for much of our past—a future "
7457 "<emphasis>for</emphasis> our past. The technology of digital arts could make "
7458 "the dream of the Library of Alexandria real again."
7461 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7462 #: freeculture.xml:5683
7464 "Technologists have thus removed the economic costs of building such an "
7465 "archive. But lawyers' costs remain. For as much as we might like to call "
7466 "these \"archives,\" as warm as the idea of a \"library\" might seem, the "
7467 "\"content\" that is collected in these digital spaces is also someone's "
7468 "\"property.\" And the law of property restricts the freedoms that Kahle and "
7469 "others would exercise."
7472 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
7473 #: freeculture.xml:5693
7474 msgid "CHAPTER TEN: \"Property\""
7477 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
7478 #: freeculture.xml:5702
7479 msgid "Johnson, Lyndon"
7482 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7483 #: freeculture.xml:5695
7485 "Jack Valenti has been the president of the Motion Picture Association of "
7486 "America since 1966. He first came to Washington, D.C., with Lyndon Johnson's "
7487 "administration—literally. The famous picture of Johnson's swearing-in "
7488 "on Air Force One after the assassination of President Kennedy has Valenti in "
7489 "the background. In his almost forty years of running the MPAA, Valenti has "
7490 "established himself as perhaps the most prominent and effective lobbyist in "
7491 "Washington. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
7494 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
7495 #: freeculture.xml:5715
7496 msgid "Disney, Inc."
7499 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
7500 #: freeculture.xml:5716
7501 msgid "Sony Pictures Entertainment"
7504 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
7505 #: freeculture.xml:5717
7509 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
7510 #: freeculture.xml:5718
7511 msgid "Paramount Pictures"
7514 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
7515 #: freeculture.xml:5719
7516 msgid "Twentieth Century Fox"
7519 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
7520 #: freeculture.xml:5720
7521 msgid "Universal Pictures"
7524 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
7525 #: freeculture.xml:5721 freeculture.xml:7125
7526 msgid "Warner Brothers"
7529 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7530 #: freeculture.xml:5705
7532 "The MPAA is the American branch of the international Motion Picture "
7533 "Association. It was formed in 1922 as a trade association whose goal was to "
7534 "defend American movies against increasing domestic criticism. The "
7535 "organization now represents not only filmmakers but producers and "
7536 "distributors of entertainment for television, video, and cable. Its board is "
7537 "made up of the chairmen and presidents of the seven major producers and "
7538 "distributors of motion picture and television programs in the United States: "
7539 "Walt Disney, Sony Pictures Entertainment, MGM, Paramount Pictures, Twentieth "
7540 "Century Fox, Universal Studios, and Warner Brothers. <placeholder "
7541 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/> "
7542 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"2\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
7543 "id=\"3\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"4\"/> <placeholder "
7544 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"5\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"6\"/>"
7548 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7549 #: freeculture.xml:5725
7551 "Valenti is only the third president of the MPAA. No president before him has "
7552 "had as much influence over that organization, or over Washington. As a "
7553 "Texan, Valenti has mastered the single most important political skill of a "
7554 "Southerner—the ability to appear simple and slow while hiding a "
7555 "lightning-fast intellect. To this day, Valenti plays the simple, humble "
7556 "man. But this Harvard MBA, and author of four books, who finished high "
7557 "school at the age of fifteen and flew more than fifty combat missions in "
7558 "World War II, is no Mr. Smith. When Valenti went to Washington, he mastered "
7559 "the city in a quintessentially Washingtonian way."
7562 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7563 #: freeculture.xml:5737
7565 "In defending artistic liberty and the freedom of speech that our culture "
7566 "depends upon, the MPAA has done important good. In crafting the MPAA rating "
7567 "system, it has probably avoided a great deal of speech-regulating harm. But "
7568 "there is an aspect to the organization's mission that is both the most "
7569 "radical and the most important. This is the organization's effort, "
7570 "epitomized in Valenti's every act, to redefine the meaning of \"creative "
7574 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7575 #: freeculture.xml:5746
7576 msgid "In 1982, Valenti's testimony to Congress captured the strategy perfectly:"
7580 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
7581 #: freeculture.xml:5760
7583 "Home Recording of Copyrighted Works: Hearings on H.R. 4783, H.R. 4794, "
7584 "H.R. 4808, H.R. 5250, H.R. 5488, and H.R. 5705 Before the Subcommittee on "
7585 "Courts, Civil Liberties, and the Administration of Justice of the Committee "
7586 "on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives, 97th Cong., 2nd "
7587 "sess. (1982): 65 (testimony of Jack Valenti)."
7590 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
7591 #: freeculture.xml:5751
7593 "No matter the lengthy arguments made, no matter the charges and the "
7594 "counter-charges, no matter the tumult and the shouting, reasonable men and "
7595 "women will keep returning to the fundamental issue, the central theme which "
7596 "animates this entire debate: <emphasis>Creative property owners must be "
7597 "accorded the same rights and protection resident in all other property "
7598 "owners in the nation</emphasis>. That is the issue. That is the "
7599 "question. And that is the rostrum on which this entire hearing and the "
7600 "debates to follow must rest.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
7604 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7605 #: freeculture.xml:5770
7607 "The strategy of this rhetoric, like the strategy of most of Valenti's "
7608 "rhetoric, is brilliant and simple and brilliant because simple. The "
7609 "\"central theme\" to which \"reasonable men and women\" will return is this: "
7610 "\"Creative property owners must be accorded the same rights and protections "
7611 "resident in all other property owners in the nation.\" There are no "
7612 "second-class citizens, Valenti might have continued. There should be no "
7613 "second-class property owners."
7616 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7617 #: freeculture.xml:5781
7619 "This claim has an obvious and powerful intuitive pull. It is stated with "
7620 "such clarity as to make the idea as obvious as the notion that we use "
7621 "elections to pick presidents. But in fact, there is no more extreme a claim "
7622 "made by <emphasis>anyone</emphasis> who is serious in this debate than this "
7623 "claim of Valenti's. Jack Valenti, however sweet and however brilliant, is "
7624 "perhaps the nation's foremost extremist when it comes to the nature and "
7625 "scope of \"creative property.\" His views have <emphasis>no</emphasis> "
7626 "reasonable connection to our actual legal tradition, even if the subtle pull "
7627 "of his Texan charm has slowly redefined that tradition, at least in "
7632 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
7633 #: freeculture.xml:5796
7635 "Lawyers speak of \"property\" not as an absolute thing, but as a bundle of "
7636 "rights that are sometimes associated with a particular object. Thus, my "
7637 "\"property right\" to my car gives me the right to exclusive use, but not "
7638 "the right to drive at 150 miles an hour. For the best effort to connect the "
7639 "ordinary meaning of \"property\" to \"lawyer talk,\" see Bruce Ackerman, "
7640 "<citetitle>Private Property and the Constitution</citetitle> (New Haven: "
7641 "Yale University Press, 1977), 26–27."
7644 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7645 #: freeculture.xml:5793
7647 "While \"creative property\" is certainly \"property\" in a nerdy and precise "
7648 "sense that lawyers are trained to understand,<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
7649 "id=\"0\"/> it has never been the case, nor should it be, that \"creative "
7650 "property owners\" have been \"accorded the same rights and protection "
7651 "resident in all other property owners.\" Indeed, if creative property owners "
7652 "were given the same rights as all other property owners, that would effect a "
7653 "radical, and radically undesirable, change in our tradition."
7656 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7657 #: freeculture.xml:5811
7659 "Valenti knows this. But he speaks for an industry that cares squat for our "
7660 "tradition and the values it represents. He speaks for an industry that is "
7661 "instead fighting to restore the tradition that the British overturned in "
7662 "1710. In the world that Valenti's changes would create, a powerful few would "
7663 "exercise powerful control over how our creative culture would develop."
7667 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7668 #: freeculture.xml:5819
7670 "I have two purposes in this chapter. The first is to convince you that, "
7671 "historically, Valenti's claim is absolutely wrong. The second is to convince "
7672 "you that it would be terribly wrong for us to reject our history. We have "
7673 "always treated rights in creative property differently from the rights "
7674 "resident in all other property owners. They have never been the same. And "
7675 "they should never be the same, because, however counterintuitive this may "
7676 "seem, to make them the same would be to fundamentally weaken the opportunity "
7677 "for new creators to create. Creativity depends upon the owners of "
7678 "creativity having less than perfect control."
7681 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7682 #: freeculture.xml:5834
7684 "Organizations such as the MPAA, whose board includes the most powerful of "
7685 "the old guard, have little interest, their rhetoric notwithstanding, in "
7686 "assuring that the new can displace them. No organization does. No person "
7687 "does. (Ask me about tenure, for example.) But what's good for the MPAA is "
7688 "not necessarily good for America. A society that defends the ideals of free "
7689 "culture must preserve precisely the opportunity for new creativity to "
7690 "threaten the old. To get just a hint that there is something fundamentally "
7691 "wrong in Valenti's argument, we need look no further than the United States "
7692 "Constitution itself."
7695 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7696 #: freeculture.xml:5846
7698 "The framers of our Constitution loved \"property.\" Indeed, so strongly did "
7699 "they love property that they built into the Constitution an important "
7700 "requirement. If the government takes your property—if it condemns your "
7701 "house, or acquires a slice of land from your farm—it is required, "
7702 "under the Fifth Amendment's \"Takings Clause,\" to pay you \"just "
7703 "compensation\" for that taking. The Constitution thus guarantees that "
7704 "property is, in a certain sense, sacred. It cannot <emphasis>ever</emphasis> "
7705 "be taken from the property owner unless the government pays for the "
7710 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7711 #: freeculture.xml:5857
7713 "Yet the very same Constitution speaks very differently about what Valenti "
7714 "calls \"creative property.\" In the clause granting Congress the power to "
7715 "create \"creative property,\" the Constitution <emphasis>requires</emphasis> "
7716 "that after a \"limited time,\" Congress take back the rights that it has "
7717 "granted and set the \"creative property\" free to the public domain. Yet "
7718 "when Congress does this, when the expiration of a copyright term \"takes\" "
7719 "your copyright and turns it over to the public domain, Congress does not "
7720 "have any obligation to pay \"just compensation\" for this \"taking.\" "
7721 "Instead, the same Constitution that requires compensation for your land "
7722 "requires that you lose your \"creative property\" right without any "
7723 "compensation at all."
7726 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7727 #: freeculture.xml:5872
7729 "The Constitution thus on its face states that these two forms of property "
7730 "are not to be accorded the same rights. They are plainly to be treated "
7731 "differently. Valenti is therefore not just asking for a change in our "
7732 "tradition when he argues that creative-property owners should be accorded "
7733 "the same rights as every other property-right owner. He is effectively "
7734 "arguing for a change in our Constitution itself."
7737 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7738 #: freeculture.xml:5881
7740 "Arguing for a change in our Constitution is not necessarily wrong. There "
7741 "was much in our original Constitution that was plainly wrong. The "
7742 "Constitution of 1789 entrenched slavery; it left senators to be appointed "
7743 "rather than elected; it made it possible for the electoral college to "
7744 "produce a tie between the president and his own vice president (as it did in "
7745 "1800). The framers were no doubt extraordinary, but I would be the first to "
7746 "admit that they made big mistakes. We have since rejected some of those "
7747 "mistakes; no doubt there could be others that we should reject as well. So "
7748 "my argument is not simply that because Jefferson did it, we should, too."
7751 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7752 #: freeculture.xml:5893
7754 "Instead, my argument is that because Jefferson did it, we should at least "
7755 "try to understand <emphasis>why</emphasis>. Why did the framers, fanatical "
7756 "property types that they were, reject the claim that creative property be "
7757 "given the same rights as all other property? Why did they require that for "
7758 "creative property there must be a public domain?"
7761 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7762 #: freeculture.xml:5901
7764 "To answer this question, we need to get some perspective on the history of "
7765 "these \"creative property\" rights, and the control that they enabled. Once "
7766 "we see clearly how differently these rights have been defined, we will be in "
7767 "a better position to ask the question that should be at the core of this "
7768 "war: Not <emphasis>whether</emphasis> creative property should be protected, "
7769 "but how. Not <emphasis>whether</emphasis> we will enforce the rights the law "
7770 "gives to creative-property owners, but what the particular mix of rights "
7771 "ought to be. Not <emphasis>whether</emphasis> artists should be paid, but "
7772 "whether institutions designed to assure that artists get paid need also "
7773 "control how culture develops."
7777 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7778 #: freeculture.xml:5916
7780 "To answer these questions, we need a more general way to talk about how "
7781 "property is protected. More precisely, we need a more general way than the "
7782 "narrow language of the law allows. In <citetitle>Code and Other Laws of "
7783 "Cyberspace</citetitle>, I used a simple model to capture this more general "
7784 "perspective. For any particular right or regulation, this model asks how "
7785 "four different modalities of regulation interact to support or weaken the "
7786 "right or regulation. I represented it with this diagram:"
7789 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><figure><title>
7790 #: freeculture.xml:5925
7792 "How four different modalities of regulation interact to support or weaken "
7793 "the right or regulation."
7796 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
7797 #: freeculture.xml:5926 freeculture.xml:6101 freeculture.xml:6402
7798 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1331.png\"></graphic>"
7801 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7802 #: freeculture.xml:5929
7804 "At the center of this picture is a regulated dot: the individual or group "
7805 "that is the target of regulation, or the holder of a right. (In each case "
7806 "throughout, we can describe this either as regulation or as a right. For "
7807 "simplicity's sake, I will speak only of regulations.) The ovals represent "
7808 "four ways in which the individual or group might be regulated— either "
7809 "constrained or, alternatively, enabled. Law is the most obvious constraint "
7810 "(to lawyers, at least). It constrains by threatening punishments after the "
7811 "fact if the rules set in advance are violated. So if, for example, you "
7812 "willfully infringe Madonna's copyright by copying a song from her latest CD "
7813 "and posting it on the Web, you can be punished with a $150,000 fine. The "
7814 "fine is an ex post punishment for violating an ex ante rule. It is imposed "
7815 "by the state. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
7818 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7819 #: freeculture.xml:5946
7821 "Norms are a different kind of constraint. They, too, punish an individual "
7822 "for violating a rule. But the punishment of a norm is imposed by a "
7823 "community, not (or not only) by the state. There may be no law against "
7824 "spitting, but that doesn't mean you won't be punished if you spit on the "
7825 "ground while standing in line at a movie. The punishment might not be harsh, "
7826 "though depending upon the community, it could easily be more harsh than many "
7827 "of the punishments imposed by the state. The mark of the difference is not "
7828 "the severity of the rule, but the source of the enforcement."
7831 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7832 #: freeculture.xml:5957
7834 "The market is a third type of constraint. Its constraint is effected through "
7835 "conditions: You can do X if you pay Y; you'll be paid M if you do N. These "
7836 "constraints are obviously not independent of law or norms—it is "
7837 "property law that defines what must be bought if it is to be taken legally; "
7838 "it is norms that say what is appropriately sold. But given a set of norms, "
7839 "and a background of property and contract law, the market imposes a "
7840 "simultaneous constraint upon how an individual or group might behave."
7843 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7844 #: freeculture.xml:5967
7846 "Finally, and for the moment, perhaps, most mysteriously, "
7847 "\"architecture\"—the physical world as one finds it—is a "
7848 "constraint on behavior. A fallen bridge might constrain your ability to get "
7849 "across a river. Railroad tracks might constrain the ability of a community "
7850 "to integrate its social life. As with the market, architecture does not "
7851 "effect its constraint through ex post punishments. Instead, also as with the "
7852 "market, architecture effects its constraint through simultaneous "
7853 "conditions. These conditions are imposed not by courts enforcing contracts, "
7854 "or by police punishing theft, but by nature, by \"architecture.\" If a "
7855 "500-pound boulder blocks your way, it is the law of gravity that enforces "
7856 "this constraint. If a $500 airplane ticket stands between you and a flight "
7857 "to New York, it is the market that enforces this constraint."
7861 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7862 #: freeculture.xml:5984
7864 "So the first point about these four modalities of regulation is obvious: "
7865 "They interact. Restrictions imposed by one might be reinforced by "
7866 "another. Or restrictions imposed by one might be undermined by another."
7869 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7870 #: freeculture.xml:5990
7872 "The second point follows directly: If we want to understand the effective "
7873 "freedom that anyone has at a given moment to do any particular thing, we "
7874 "have to consider how these four modalities interact. Whether or not there "
7875 "are other constraints (there may well be; my claim is not about "
7876 "comprehensiveness), these four are among the most significant, and any "
7877 "regulator (whether controlling or freeing) must consider how these four in "
7878 "particular interact."
7881 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
7882 #: freeculture.xml:5999
7883 msgid "driving speed, constraints on"
7886 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7887 #: freeculture.xml:6002
7889 "So, for example, consider the \"freedom\" to drive a car at a high "
7890 "speed. That freedom is in part restricted by laws: speed limits that say how "
7891 "fast you can drive in particular places at particular times. It is in part "
7892 "restricted by architecture: speed bumps, for example, slow most rational "
7893 "drivers; governors in buses, as another example, set the maximum rate at "
7894 "which the driver can drive. The freedom is in part restricted by the market: "
7895 "Fuel efficiency drops as speed increases, thus the price of gasoline "
7896 "indirectly constrains speed. And finally, the norms of a community may or "
7897 "may not constrain the freedom to speed. Drive at 50 mph by a school in your "
7898 "own neighborhood and you're likely to be punished by the neighbors. The same "
7899 "norm wouldn't be as effective in a different town, or at night."
7903 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
7904 #: freeculture.xml:6020
7906 "By describing the way law affects the other three modalities, I don't mean "
7907 "to suggest that the other three don't affect law. Obviously, they do. Law's "
7908 "only distinction is that it alone speaks as if it has a right "
7909 "self-consciously to change the other three. The right of the other three is "
7910 "more timidly expressed. See Lawrence Lessig, <citetitle>Code: And Other "
7911 "Laws of Cyberspace</citetitle> (New York: Basic Books, 1999): 90–95; "
7912 "Lawrence Lessig, \"The New Chicago School,\" <citetitle>Journal of Legal "
7913 "Studies</citetitle>, June 1998."
7917 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7918 #: freeculture.xml:6016
7920 "The final point about this simple model should also be fairly clear: While "
7921 "these four modalities are analytically independent, law has a special role "
7922 "in affecting the three.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The law, in "
7923 "other words, sometimes operates to increase or decrease the constraint of a "
7924 "particular modality. Thus, the law might be used to increase taxes on "
7925 "gasoline, so as to increase the incentives to drive more slowly. The law "
7926 "might be used to mandate more speed bumps, so as to increase the difficulty "
7927 "of driving rapidly. The law might be used to fund ads that stigmatize "
7928 "reckless driving. Or the law might be used to require that other laws be "
7929 "more strict—a federal requirement that states decrease the speed "
7930 "limit, for example—so as to decrease the attractiveness of fast "
7934 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><figure><title>
7935 #: freeculture.xml:6044
7936 msgid "Law has a special role in affecting the three."
7939 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><figure>
7940 #: freeculture.xml:6045
7941 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1361.png\"></graphic>"
7944 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
7945 #: freeculture.xml:6084
7946 msgid "Commons, John R."
7949 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
7950 #: freeculture.xml:6056
7952 "Some people object to this way of talking about \"liberty.\" They object "
7953 "because their focus when considering the constraints that exist at any "
7954 "particular moment are constraints imposed exclusively by the government. For "
7955 "instance, if a storm destroys a bridge, these people think it is meaningless "
7956 "to say that one's liberty has been restrained. A bridge has washed out, and "
7957 "it's harder to get from one place to another. To talk about this as a loss "
7958 "of freedom, they say, is to confuse the stuff of politics with the vagaries "
7959 "of ordinary life. I don't mean to deny the value in this narrower view, "
7960 "which depends upon the context of the inquiry. I do, however, mean to argue "
7961 "against any insistence that this narrower view is the only proper view of "
7962 "liberty. As I argued in <citetitle>Code</citetitle>, we come from a long "
7963 "tradition of political thought with a broader focus than the narrow question "
7964 "of what the government did when. John Stuart Mill defended freedom of "
7965 "speech, for example, from the tyranny of narrow minds, not from the fear of "
7966 "government prosecution; John Stuart Mill, <citetitle>On Liberty</citetitle> "
7967 "(Indiana: Hackett Publishing Co., 1978), 19. John R. Commons famously "
7968 "defended the economic freedom of labor from constraints imposed by the "
7969 "market; John R. Commons, \"The Right to Work,\" in Malcom Rutherford and "
7970 "Warren J. Samuels, eds., <citetitle>John R. Commons: Selected "
7971 "Essays</citetitle> (London: Routledge: 1997), 62. The Americans with "
7972 "Disabilities Act increases the liberty of people with physical disabilities "
7973 "by changing the architecture of certain public places, thereby making access "
7974 "to those places easier; 42 <citetitle>United States Code</citetitle>, "
7975 "section 12101 (2000). Each of these interventions to change existing "
7976 "conditions changes the liberty of a particular group. The effect of those "
7977 "interventions should be accounted for in order to understand the effective "
7978 "liberty that each of these groups might face. <placeholder "
7979 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
7982 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
7983 #: freeculture.xml:6048
7985 "These constraints can thus change, and they can be changed. To understand "
7986 "the effective protection of liberty or protection of property at any "
7987 "particular moment, we must track these changes over time. A restriction "
7988 "imposed by one modality might be erased by another. A freedom enabled by one "
7989 "modality might be displaced by another.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
7993 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
7994 #: freeculture.xml:6088
7995 msgid "Why Hollywood Is Right"
7998 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
7999 #: freeculture.xml:6090
8001 "The most obvious point that this model reveals is just why, or just how, "
8002 "Hollywood is right. The copyright warriors have rallied Congress and the "
8003 "courts to defend copyright. This model helps us see why that rallying makes "
8007 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8008 #: freeculture.xml:6096
8009 msgid "Let's say this is the picture of copyright's regulation before the Internet:"
8012 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
8013 #: freeculture.xml:6100 freeculture.xml:6401
8014 msgid "Copyright's regulation before the Internet."
8018 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8019 #: freeculture.xml:6105
8021 "There is balance between law, norms, market, and architecture. The law "
8022 "limits the ability to copy and share content, by imposing penalties on those "
8023 "who copy and share content. Those penalties are reinforced by technologies "
8024 "that make it hard to copy and share content (architecture) and expensive to "
8025 "copy and share content (market). Finally, those penalties are mitigated by "
8026 "norms we all recognize—kids, for example, taping other kids' "
8027 "records. These uses of copyrighted material may well be infringement, but "
8028 "the norms of our society (before the Internet, at least) had no problem with "
8029 "this form of infringement."
8032 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8033 #: freeculture.xml:6117
8035 "Enter the Internet, or, more precisely, technologies such as MP3s and p2p "
8036 "sharing. Now the constraint of architecture changes dramatically, as does "
8037 "the constraint of the market. And as both the market and architecture relax "
8038 "the regulation of copyright, norms pile on. The happy balance (for the "
8039 "warriors, at least) of life before the Internet becomes an effective state "
8040 "of anarchy after the Internet."
8044 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8045 #: freeculture.xml:6125
8047 "Thus the sense of, and justification for, the warriors' response. "
8048 "Technology has changed, the warriors say, and the effect of this change, "
8049 "when ramified through the market and norms, is that a balance of protection "
8050 "for the copyright owners' rights has been lost. This is Iraq after the fall "
8051 "of Saddam, but this time no government is justifying the looting that "
8055 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
8056 #: freeculture.xml:6135
8057 msgid "effective state of anarchy after the Internet."
8060 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
8061 #: freeculture.xml:6136
8062 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1381.png\"></graphic>"
8065 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8066 #: freeculture.xml:6139
8068 "Neither this analysis nor the conclusions that follow are new to the "
8069 "warriors. Indeed, in a \"White Paper\" prepared by the Commerce Department "
8070 "(one heavily influenced by the copyright warriors) in 1995, this mix of "
8071 "regulatory modalities had already been identified and the strategy to "
8072 "respond already mapped. In response to the changes the Internet had "
8073 "effected, the White Paper argued (1) Congress should strengthen intellectual "
8074 "property law, (2) businesses should adopt innovative marketing techniques, "
8075 "(3) technologists should push to develop code to protect copyrighted "
8076 "material, and (4) educators should educate kids to better protect copyright."
8080 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8081 #: freeculture.xml:6151
8083 "This mixed strategy is just what copyright needed—if it was to "
8084 "preserve the particular balance that existed before the change induced by "
8085 "the Internet. And it's just what we should expect the content industry to "
8086 "push for. It is as American as apple pie to consider the happy life you have "
8087 "as an entitlement, and to look to the law to protect it if something comes "
8088 "along to change that happy life. Homeowners living in a flood plain have no "
8089 "hesitation appealing to the government to rebuild (and rebuild again) when a "
8090 "flood (architecture) wipes away their property (law). Farmers have no "
8091 "hesitation appealing to the government to bail them out when a virus "
8092 "(architecture) devastates their crop. Unions have no hesitation appealing to "
8093 "the government to bail them out when imports (market) wipe out the "
8094 "U.S. steel industry."
8097 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8098 #: freeculture.xml:6168
8100 "Thus, there's nothing wrong or surprising in the content industry's campaign "
8101 "to protect itself from the harmful consequences of a technological "
8102 "innovation. And I would be the last person to argue that the changing "
8103 "technology of the Internet has not had a profound effect on the content "
8104 "industry's way of doing business, or as John Seely Brown describes it, its "
8105 "\"architecture of revenue.\""
8109 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8110 #: freeculture.xml:6184
8112 "See Geoffrey Smith, \"Film vs. Digital: Can Kodak Build a Bridge?\" "
8113 "BusinessWeek online, 2 August 1999, available at <ulink "
8114 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #23</ulink>. For a more recent "
8115 "analysis of Kodak's place in the market, see Chana R. Schoenberger, \"Can "
8116 "Kodak Make Up for Lost Moments?\" Forbes.com, 6 October 2003, available at "
8117 "<ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #24</ulink>."
8120 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8121 #: freeculture.xml:6176
8123 "But just because a particular interest asks for government support, it "
8124 "doesn't follow that support should be granted. And just because technology "
8125 "has weakened a particular way of doing business, it doesn't follow that the "
8126 "government should intervene to support that old way of doing "
8127 "business. Kodak, for example, has lost perhaps as much as 20 percent of "
8128 "their traditional film market to the emerging technologies of digital "
8129 "cameras.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Does anyone believe the "
8130 "government should ban digital cameras just to support Kodak? Highways have "
8131 "weakened the freight business for railroads. Does anyone think we should ban "
8132 "trucks from roads <emphasis>for the purpose of</emphasis> protecting the "
8133 "railroads? Closer to the subject of this book, remote channel changers have "
8134 "weakened the \"stickiness\" of television advertising (if a boring "
8135 "commercial comes on the TV, the remote makes it easy to surf ), and it may "
8136 "well be that this change has weakened the television advertising market. But "
8137 "does anyone believe we should regulate remotes to reinforce commercial "
8138 "television? (Maybe by limiting them to function only once a second, or to "
8139 "switch to only ten channels within an hour?)"
8143 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8144 #: freeculture.xml:6216
8146 "Fred Warshofsky, <citetitle>The Patent Wars</citetitle> (New York: Wiley, "
8147 "1994), 170–71."
8150 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><indexterm><primary>
8151 #: freeculture.xml:6225 freeculture.xml:12600
8155 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8156 #: freeculture.xml:6206
8158 "The obvious answer to these obviously rhetorical questions is no. In a free "
8159 "society, with a free market, supported by free enterprise and free trade, "
8160 "the government's role is not to support one way of doing business against "
8161 "others. Its role is not to pick winners and protect them against loss. If "
8162 "the government did this generally, then we would never have any progress. As "
8163 "Microsoft chairman Bill Gates wrote in 1991, in a memo criticizing software "
8164 "patents, \"established companies have an interest in excluding future "
8165 "competitors.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> And relative to a "
8166 "startup, established companies also have the means. (Think RCA and FM "
8167 "radio.) A world in which competitors with new ideas must fight not only the "
8168 "market but also the government is a world in which competitors with new "
8169 "ideas will not succeed. It is a world of stasis and increasingly "
8170 "concentrated stagnation. It is the Soviet Union under Brezhnev. "
8171 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
8174 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8175 #: freeculture.xml:6228
8177 "Thus, while it is understandable for industries threatened with new "
8178 "technologies that change the way they do business to look to the government "
8179 "for protection, it is the special duty of policy makers to guarantee that "
8180 "that protection not become a deterrent to progress. It is the duty of policy "
8181 "makers, in other words, to assure that the changes they create, in response "
8182 "to the request of those hurt by changing technology, are changes that "
8183 "preserve the incentives and opportunities for innovation and change."
8186 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8187 #: freeculture.xml:6238
8189 "In the context of laws regulating speech—which include, obviously, "
8190 "copyright law—that duty is even stronger. When the industry "
8191 "complaining about changing technologies is asking Congress to respond in a "
8192 "way that burdens speech and creativity, policy makers should be especially "
8193 "wary of the request. It is always a bad deal for the government to get into "
8194 "the business of regulating speech markets. The risks and dangers of that "
8195 "game are precisely why our framers created the First Amendment to our "
8196 "Constitution: \"Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of "
8197 "speech.\" So when Congress is being asked to pass laws that would "
8198 "\"abridge\" the freedom of speech, it should ask— "
8199 "carefully—whether such regulation is justified."
8203 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8204 #: freeculture.xml:6252
8206 "My argument just now, however, has nothing to do with whether the changes "
8207 "that are being pushed by the copyright warriors are \"justified.\" My "
8208 "argument is about their effect. For before we get to the question of "
8209 "justification, a hard question that depends a great deal upon your values, "
8210 "we should first ask whether we understand the effect of the changes the "
8211 "content industry wants."
8214 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8215 #: freeculture.xml:6261
8216 msgid "Here's the metaphor that will capture the argument to follow."
8219 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
8220 #: freeculture.xml:6264
8224 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
8225 #: freeculture.xml:6272
8226 msgid "Müller, Paul Hermann"
8229 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8230 #: freeculture.xml:6267
8232 "In 1873, the chemical DDT was first synthesized. In 1948, Swiss chemist Paul "
8233 "Hermann Müller won the Nobel Prize for his work demonstrating the "
8234 "insecticidal properties of DDT. By the 1950s, the insecticide was widely "
8235 "used around the world to kill disease-carrying pests. It was also used to "
8236 "increase farm production. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
8239 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8240 #: freeculture.xml:6275
8242 "No one doubts that killing disease-carrying pests or increasing crop "
8243 "production is a good thing. No one doubts that the work of Müller was "
8244 "important and valuable and probably saved lives, possibly millions."
8247 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
8248 #: freeculture.xml:6279 freeculture.xml:6285
8249 msgid "Carson, Rachel"
8252 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
8253 #: freeculture.xml:6286
8254 msgid "Silent Sprint (Carson)"
8257 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8258 #: freeculture.xml:6281
8260 "But in 1962, Rachel Carson published <citetitle>Silent Spring</citetitle>, "
8261 "which argued that DDT, whatever its primary benefits, was also having "
8262 "unintended environmental consequences. Birds were losing the ability to "
8263 "reproduce. Whole chains of the ecology were being destroyed. <placeholder "
8264 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
8267 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8268 #: freeculture.xml:6289
8270 "No one set out to destroy the environment. Paul Müller certainly did not aim "
8271 "to harm any birds. But the effort to solve one set of problems produced "
8272 "another set which, in the view of some, was far worse than the problems that "
8273 "were originally attacked. Or more accurately, the problems DDT caused were "
8274 "worse than the problems it solved, at least when considering the other, more "
8275 "environmentally friendly ways to solve the problems that DDT was meant to "
8280 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8281 #: freeculture.xml:6302
8283 "See, for example, James Boyle, \"A Politics of Intellectual Property: "
8284 "Environmentalism for the Net?\" <citetitle>Duke Law Journal</citetitle> 47 "
8289 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8290 #: freeculture.xml:6298
8292 "It is to this image precisely that Duke University law professor James Boyle "
8293 "appeals when he argues that we need an \"environmentalism\" for "
8294 "culture.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> His point, and the point I "
8295 "want to develop in the balance of this chapter, is not that the aims of "
8296 "copyright are flawed. Or that authors should not be paid for their work. Or "
8297 "that music should be given away \"for free.\" The point is that some of the "
8298 "ways in which we might protect authors will have unintended consequences for "
8299 "the cultural environment, much like DDT had for the natural environment. And "
8300 "just as criticism of DDT is not an endorsement of malaria or an attack on "
8301 "farmers, so, too, is criticism of one particular set of regulations "
8302 "protecting copyright not an endorsement of anarchy or an attack on authors. "
8303 "It is an environment of creativity that we seek, and we should be aware of "
8304 "our actions' effects on the environment."
8307 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8308 #: freeculture.xml:6319
8310 "My argument, in the balance of this chapter, tries to map exactly this "
8311 "effect. No doubt the technology of the Internet has had a dramatic effect on "
8312 "the ability of copyright owners to protect their content. But there should "
8313 "also be little doubt that when you add together the changes in copyright law "
8314 "over time, plus the change in technology that the Internet is undergoing "
8315 "just now, the net effect of these changes will not be only that copyrighted "
8316 "work is effectively protected. Also, and generally missed, the net effect of "
8317 "this massive increase in protection will be devastating to the environment "
8321 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8322 #: freeculture.xml:6330
8324 "In a line: To kill a gnat, we are spraying DDT with consequences for free "
8325 "culture that will be far more devastating than that this gnat will be lost."
8328 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
8329 #: freeculture.xml:6337
8333 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8334 #: freeculture.xml:6339
8336 "America copied English copyright law. Actually, we copied and improved "
8337 "English copyright law. Our Constitution makes the purpose of \"creative "
8338 "property\" rights clear; its express limitations reinforce the English aim "
8339 "to avoid overly powerful publishers."
8342 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8343 #: freeculture.xml:6345
8345 "The power to establish \"creative property\" rights is granted to Congress "
8346 "in a way that, for our Constitution, at least, is very odd. Article I, "
8347 "section 8, clause 8 of our Constitution states that:"
8351 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8352 #: freeculture.xml:6350
8354 "Congress has the power to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, "
8355 "by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right "
8356 "to their respective Writings and Discoveries. We can call this the "
8357 "\"Progress Clause,\" for notice what this clause does not say. It does not "
8358 "say Congress has the power to grant \"creative property rights.\" It says "
8359 "that Congress has the power <emphasis>to promote progress</emphasis>. The "
8360 "grant of power is its purpose, and its purpose is a public one, not the "
8361 "purpose of enriching publishers, nor even primarily the purpose of rewarding "
8365 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8366 #: freeculture.xml:6363
8368 "The Progress Clause expressly limits the term of copyrights. As we saw in "
8369 "chapter 6, the English limited the term of copyright so as to assure that a "
8370 "few would not exercise disproportionate control over culture by exercising "
8371 "disproportionate control over publishing. We can assume the framers followed "
8372 "the English for a similar purpose. Indeed, unlike the English, the framers "
8373 "reinforced that objective, by requiring that copyrights extend \"to "
8377 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8378 #: freeculture.xml:6372
8380 "The design of the Progress Clause reflects something about the "
8381 "Constitution's design in general. To avoid a problem, the framers built "
8382 "structure. To prevent the concentrated power of publishers, they built a "
8383 "structure that kept copyrights away from publishers and kept them short. To "
8384 "prevent the concentrated power of a church, they banned the federal "
8385 "government from establishing a church. To prevent concentrating power in the "
8386 "federal government, they built structures to reinforce the power of the "
8387 "states—including the Senate, whose members were at the time selected "
8388 "by the states, and an electoral college, also selected by the states, to "
8389 "select the president. In each case, a <emphasis>structure</emphasis> built "
8390 "checks and balances into the constitutional frame, structured to prevent "
8391 "otherwise inevitable concentrations of power."
8394 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8395 #: freeculture.xml:6387
8397 "I doubt the framers would recognize the regulation we call \"copyright\" "
8398 "today. The scope of that regulation is far beyond anything they ever "
8399 "considered. To begin to understand what they did, we need to put our "
8400 "\"copyright\" in context: We need to see how it has changed in the 210 years "
8401 "since they first struck its design."
8405 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8406 #: freeculture.xml:6394
8408 "Some of these changes come from the law: some in light of changes in "
8409 "technology, and some in light of changes in technology given a particular "
8410 "concentration of market power. In terms of our model, we started here:"
8413 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8414 #: freeculture.xml:6405
8415 msgid "We will end here:"
8418 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
8419 #: freeculture.xml:6408
8420 msgid ""Copyright" today."
8423 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
8424 #: freeculture.xml:6409
8425 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1442.png\"></graphic>"
8429 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8430 #: freeculture.xml:6412
8431 msgid "Let me explain how."
8434 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
8435 #: freeculture.xml:6417
8436 msgid "Law: Duration"
8439 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
8440 #: freeculture.xml:6433
8441 msgid "Crosskey, William W."
8444 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8445 #: freeculture.xml:6427
8447 "William W. Crosskey, <citetitle>Politics and the Constitution in the History "
8448 "of the United States</citetitle> (London: Cambridge University Press, 1953), "
8449 "vol. 1, 485–86: \"extinguish[ing], by plain implication of `the "
8450 "supreme Law of the Land,' <emphasis>the perpetual rights which authors had, "
8451 "or were supposed by some to have, under the Common Law</emphasis>\" "
8452 "(emphasis added). <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
8455 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8456 #: freeculture.xml:6419
8458 "When the first Congress enacted laws to protect creative property, it faced "
8459 "the same uncertainty about the status of creative property that the English "
8460 "had confronted in 1774. Many states had passed laws protecting creative "
8461 "property, and some believed that these laws simply supplemented common law "
8462 "rights that already protected creative authorship.<placeholder "
8463 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> This meant that there was no guaranteed public "
8464 "domain in the United States in 1790. If copyrights were protected by the "
8465 "common law, then there was no simple way to know whether a work published in "
8466 "the United States was controlled or free. Just as in England, this lingering "
8467 "uncertainty would make it hard for publishers to rely upon a public domain "
8468 "to reprint and distribute works."
8471 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8472 #: freeculture.xml:6443
8474 "That uncertainty ended after Congress passed legislation granting "
8475 "copyrights. Because federal law overrides any contrary state law, federal "
8476 "protections for copyrighted works displaced any state law protections. Just "
8477 "as in England the Statute of Anne eventually meant that the copyrights for "
8478 "all English works expired, a federal statute meant that any state copyrights "
8482 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8483 #: freeculture.xml:6451
8485 "In 1790, Congress enacted the first copyright law. It created a federal "
8486 "copyright and secured that copyright for fourteen years. If the author was "
8487 "alive at the end of that fourteen years, then he could opt to renew the "
8488 "copyright for another fourteen years. If he did not renew the copyright, his "
8489 "work passed into the public domain."
8493 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8494 #: freeculture.xml:6466
8496 "Although 13,000 titles were published in the United States from 1790 to "
8497 "1799, only 556 copyright registrations were filed; John Tebbel, <citetitle>A "
8498 "History of Book Publishing in the United States</citetitle>, vol. 1, "
8499 "<citetitle>The Creation of an Industry, 1630–1865</citetitle> (New "
8500 "York: Bowker, 1972), 141. Of the 21,000 imprints recorded before 1790, only "
8501 "twelve were copyrighted under the 1790 act; William J. Maher, "
8502 "<citetitle>Copyright Term, Retrospective Extension and the Copyright Law of "
8503 "1790 in Historical Context</citetitle>, 7–10 (2002), available at "
8504 "<ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #25</ulink>. Thus, the "
8505 "overwhelming majority of works fell immediately into the public domain. Even "
8506 "those works that were copyrighted fell into the public domain quickly, "
8507 "because the term of copyright was short. The initial term of copyright was "
8508 "fourteen years, with the option of renewal for an additional fourteen "
8509 "years. Copyright Act of May 31, 1790, §1, 1 stat. 124."
8512 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8513 #: freeculture.xml:6458
8515 "While there were many works created in the United States in the first ten "
8516 "years of the Republic, only 5 percent of the works were actually registered "
8517 "under the federal copyright regime. Of all the work created in the United "
8518 "States both before 1790 and from 1790 through 1800, 95 percent immediately "
8519 "passed into the public domain; the balance would pass into the pubic domain "
8520 "within twenty-eight years at most, and more likely within fourteen "
8521 "years.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
8525 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8526 #: freeculture.xml:6482
8528 "This system of renewal was a crucial part of the American system of "
8529 "copyright. It assured that the maximum terms of copyright would be granted "
8530 "only for works where they were wanted. After the initial term of fourteen "
8531 "years, if it wasn't worth it to an author to renew his copyright, then it "
8532 "wasn't worth it to society to insist on the copyright, either."
8536 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8537 #: freeculture.xml:6497
8539 "Few copyright holders ever chose to renew their copyrights. For instance, of "
8540 "the 25,006 copyrights registered in 1883, only 894 were renewed in 1910. For "
8541 "a year-by-year analysis of copyright renewal rates, see Barbara A. Ringer, "
8542 "\"Study No. 31: Renewal of Copyright,\" <citetitle>Studies on "
8543 "Copyright</citetitle>, vol. 1 (New York: Practicing Law Institute, 1963), "
8544 "618. For a more recent and comprehensive analysis, see William M. Landes and "
8545 "Richard A. Posner, \"Indefinitely Renewable Copyright,\" "
8546 "<citetitle>University of Chicago Law Review</citetitle> 70 (2003): 471, "
8547 "498–501, and accompanying figures."
8550 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8551 #: freeculture.xml:6491
8553 "Fourteen years may not seem long to us, but for the vast majority of "
8554 "copyright owners at that time, it was long enough: Only a small minority of "
8555 "them renewed their copyright after fourteen years; the balance allowed their "
8556 "work to pass into the public domain.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
8561 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8562 #: freeculture.xml:6512
8563 msgid "See Ringer, ch. 9, n. 2."
8566 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8567 #: freeculture.xml:6508
8569 "Even today, this structure would make sense. Most creative work has an "
8570 "actual commercial life of just a couple of years. Most books fall out of "
8571 "print after one year.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> When that "
8572 "happens, the used books are traded free of copyright regulation. Thus the "
8573 "books are no longer <emphasis>effectively</emphasis> controlled by "
8574 "copyright. The only practical commercial use of the books at that time is to "
8575 "sell the books as used books; that use—because it does not involve "
8576 "publication—is effectively free."
8579 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8580 #: freeculture.xml:6520
8582 "In the first hundred years of the Republic, the term of copyright was "
8583 "changed once. In 1831, the term was increased from a maximum of 28 years to "
8584 "a maximum of 42 by increasing the initial term of copyright from 14 years to "
8585 "28 years. In the next fifty years of the Republic, the term increased once "
8586 "again. In 1909, Congress extended the renewal term of 14 years to 28 years, "
8587 "setting a maximum term of 56 years."
8590 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8591 #: freeculture.xml:6528
8593 "Then, beginning in 1962, Congress started a practice that has defined "
8594 "copyright law since. Eleven times in the last forty years, Congress has "
8595 "extended the terms of existing copyrights; twice in those forty years, "
8596 "Congress extended the term of future copyrights. Initially, the extensions "
8597 "of existing copyrights were short, a mere one to two years. In 1976, "
8598 "Congress extended all existing copyrights by nineteen years. And in 1998, "
8599 "in the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, Congress extended the term "
8600 "of existing and future copyrights by twenty years."
8604 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8605 #: freeculture.xml:6538
8607 "The effect of these extensions is simply to toll, or delay, the passing of "
8608 "works into the public domain. This latest extension means that the public "
8609 "domain will have been tolled for thirty-nine out of fifty-five years, or 70 "
8610 "percent of the time since 1962. Thus, in the twenty years after the Sonny "
8611 "Bono Act, while one million patents will pass into the public domain, zero "
8612 "copyrights will pass into the public domain by virtue of the expiration of a "
8616 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8617 #: freeculture.xml:6549
8619 "The effect of these extensions has been exacerbated by another, "
8620 "little-noticed change in the copyright law. Remember I said that the framers "
8621 "established a two-part copyright regime, requiring a copyright owner to "
8622 "renew his copyright after an initial term. The requirement of renewal meant "
8623 "that works that no longer needed copyright protection would pass more "
8624 "quickly into the public domain. The works remaining under protection would "
8625 "be those that had some continuing commercial value."
8628 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8629 #: freeculture.xml:6559
8631 "The United States abandoned this sensible system in 1976. For all works "
8632 "created after 1978, there was only one copyright term—the maximum "
8633 "term. For \"natural\" authors, that term was life plus fifty years. For "
8634 "corporations, the term was seventy-five years. Then, in 1992, Congress "
8635 "abandoned the renewal requirement for all works created before 1978. All "
8636 "works still under copyright would be accorded the maximum term then "
8637 "available. After the Sonny Bono Act, that term was ninety-five years."
8640 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8641 #: freeculture.xml:6569
8643 "This change meant that American law no longer had an automatic way to assure "
8644 "that works that were no longer exploited passed into the public domain. And "
8645 "indeed, after these changes, it is unclear whether it is even possible to "
8646 "put works into the public domain. The public domain is orphaned by these "
8647 "changes in copyright law. Despite the requirement that terms be \"limited,\" "
8648 "we have no evidence that anything will limit them."
8652 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8653 #: freeculture.xml:6586
8655 "These statistics are understated. Between the years 1910 and 1962 (the first "
8656 "year the renewal term was extended), the average term was never more than "
8657 "thirty-two years, and averaged thirty years. See Landes and Posner, "
8658 "\"Indefinitely Renewable Copyright,\" loc. cit."
8661 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8662 #: freeculture.xml:6578
8664 "The effect of these changes on the average duration of copyright is "
8665 "dramatic. In 1973, more than 85 percent of copyright owners failed to renew "
8666 "their copyright. That meant that the average term of copyright in 1973 was "
8667 "just 32.2 years. Because of the elimination of the renewal requirement, the "
8668 "average term of copyright is now the maximum term. In thirty years, then, "
8669 "the average term has tripled, from 32.2 years to 95 years.<placeholder "
8670 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
8673 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
8674 #: freeculture.xml:6595
8678 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8679 #: freeculture.xml:6597
8681 "The \"scope\" of a copyright is the range of rights granted by the law. The "
8682 "scope of American copyright has changed dramatically. Those changes are not "
8683 "necessarily bad. But we should understand the extent of the changes if we're "
8684 "to keep this debate in context."
8687 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8688 #: freeculture.xml:6603
8690 "In 1790, that scope was very narrow. Copyright covered only \"maps, charts, "
8691 "and books.\" That means it didn't cover, for example, music or "
8692 "architecture. More significantly, the right granted by a copyright gave the "
8693 "author the exclusive right to \"publish\" copyrighted works. That means "
8694 "someone else violated the copyright only if he republished the work without "
8695 "the copyright owner's permission. Finally, the right granted by a copyright "
8696 "was an exclusive right to that particular book. The right did not extend to "
8697 "what lawyers call \"derivative works.\" It would not, therefore, interfere "
8698 "with the right of someone other than the author to translate a copyrighted "
8699 "book, or to adapt the story to a different form (such as a drama based on a "
8703 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8704 #: freeculture.xml:6616
8706 "This, too, has changed dramatically. While the contours of copyright today "
8707 "are extremely hard to describe simply, in general terms, the right covers "
8708 "practically any creative work that is reduced to a tangible form. It covers "
8709 "music as well as architecture, drama as well as computer programs. It gives "
8710 "the copyright owner of that creative work not only the exclusive right to "
8711 "\"publish\" the work, but also the exclusive right of control over any "
8712 "\"copies\" of that work. And most significant for our purposes here, the "
8713 "right gives the copyright owner control over not only his or her particular "
8714 "work, but also any \"derivative work\" that might grow out of the original "
8715 "work. In this way, the right covers more creative work, protects the "
8716 "creative work more broadly, and protects works that are based in a "
8717 "significant way on the initial creative work."
8721 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8722 #: freeculture.xml:6631
8724 "At the same time that the scope of copyright has expanded, procedural "
8725 "limitations on the right have been relaxed. I've already described the "
8726 "complete removal of the renewal requirement in 1992. In addition to the "
8727 "renewal requirement, for most of the history of American copyright law, "
8728 "there was a requirement that a work be registered before it could receive "
8729 "the protection of a copyright. There was also a requirement that any "
8730 "copyrighted work be marked either with that famous © or the word "
8731 "<emphasis>copyright</emphasis>. And for most of the history of American "
8732 "copyright law, there was a requirement that works be deposited with the "
8733 "government before a copyright could be secured."
8736 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8737 #: freeculture.xml:6645
8739 "The reason for the registration requirement was the sensible understanding "
8740 "that for most works, no copyright was required. Again, in the first ten "
8741 "years of the Republic, 95 percent of works eligible for copyright were never "
8742 "copyrighted. Thus, the rule reflected the norm: Most works apparently didn't "
8743 "need copyright, so registration narrowed the regulation of the law to the "
8744 "few that did. The same reasoning justified the requirement that a work be "
8745 "marked as copyrighted—that way it was easy to know whether a copyright "
8746 "was being claimed. The requirement that works be deposited was to assure "
8747 "that after the copyright expired, there would be a copy of the work "
8748 "somewhere so that it could be copied by others without locating the original "
8752 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8753 #: freeculture.xml:6659
8755 "All of these \"formalities\" were abolished in the American system when we "
8756 "decided to follow European copyright law. There is no requirement that you "
8757 "register a work to get a copyright; the copyright now is automatic; the "
8758 "copyright exists whether or not you mark your work with a ©; and the "
8759 "copyright exists whether or not you actually make a copy available for "
8763 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8764 #: freeculture.xml:6667
8765 msgid "Consider a practical example to understand the scope of these differences."
8769 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8770 #: freeculture.xml:6678
8772 "See Thomas Bender and David Sampliner, \"Poets, Pirates, and the Creation of "
8773 "American Literature,\" 29 <citetitle>New York University Journal of "
8774 "International Law and Politics</citetitle> 255 (1997), and James Gilraeth, "
8775 "ed., Federal Copyright Records, 1790–1800 (U.S. G.P.O., 1987)."
8778 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8779 #: freeculture.xml:6671
8781 "If, in 1790, you wrote a book and you were one of the 5 percent who actually "
8782 "copyrighted that book, then the copyright law protected you against another "
8783 "publisher's taking your book and republishing it without your "
8784 "permission. The aim of the act was to regulate publishers so as to prevent "
8785 "that kind of unfair competition. In 1790, there were 174 publishers in the "
8786 "United States.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The Copyright Act "
8787 "was thus a tiny regulation of a tiny proportion of a tiny part of the "
8788 "creative market in the United States—publishers."
8792 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8793 #: freeculture.xml:6690
8795 "The act left other creators totally unregulated. If I copied your poem by "
8796 "hand, over and over again, as a way to learn it by heart, my act was totally "
8797 "unregulated by the 1790 act. If I took your novel and made a play based upon "
8798 "it, or if I translated it or abridged it, none of those activities were "
8799 "regulated by the original copyright act. These creative activities remained "
8800 "free, while the activities of publishers were restrained."
8803 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8804 #: freeculture.xml:6699
8806 "Today the story is very different: If you write a book, your book is "
8807 "automatically protected. Indeed, not just your book. Every e-mail, every "
8808 "note to your spouse, every doodle, <emphasis>every</emphasis> creative act "
8809 "that's reduced to a tangible form—all of this is automatically "
8810 "copyrighted. There is no need to register or mark your work. The protection "
8811 "follows the creation, not the steps you take to protect it."
8814 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8815 #: freeculture.xml:6708
8817 "That protection gives you the right (subject to a narrow range of fair use "
8818 "exceptions) to control how others copy the work, whether they copy it to "
8819 "republish it or to share an excerpt."
8822 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8823 #: freeculture.xml:6713
8825 "That much is the obvious part. Any system of copyright would control "
8826 "competing publishing. But there's a second part to the copyright of today "
8827 "that is not at all obvious. This is the protection of \"derivative rights.\" "
8828 "If you write a book, no one can make a movie out of your book without "
8829 "permission. No one can translate it without permission. CliffsNotes can't "
8830 "make an abridgment unless permission is granted. All of these derivative "
8831 "uses of your original work are controlled by the copyright holder. The "
8832 "copyright, in other words, is now not just an exclusive right to your "
8833 "writings, but an exclusive right to your writings and a large proportion of "
8834 "the writings inspired by them."
8837 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8838 #: freeculture.xml:6727
8840 "It is this derivative right that would seem most bizarre to our framers, "
8841 "though it has become second nature to us. Initially, this expansion was "
8842 "created to deal with obvious evasions of a narrower copyright. If I write a "
8843 "book, can you change one word and then claim a copyright in a new and "
8844 "different book? Obviously that would make a joke of the copyright, so the "
8845 "law was properly expanded to include those slight modifications as well as "
8846 "the verbatim original work."
8849 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8850 #: freeculture.xml:6749
8852 "Jonathan Zittrain, \"The Copyright Cage,\" <citetitle>Legal "
8853 "Affairs</citetitle>, July/August 2003, available at <ulink "
8854 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #26</ulink>. <placeholder "
8855 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
8858 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8859 #: freeculture.xml:6739
8861 "In preventing that joke, the law created an astonishing power within a free "
8862 "culture—at least, it's astonishing when you understand that the law "
8863 "applies not just to the commercial publisher but to anyone with a "
8864 "computer. I understand the wrong in duplicating and selling someone else's "
8865 "work. But whatever <emphasis>that</emphasis> wrong is, transforming someone "
8866 "else's work is a different wrong. Some view transformation as no wrong at "
8867 "all—they believe that our law, as the framers penned it, should not "
8868 "protect derivative rights at all.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> "
8869 "Whether or not you go that far, it seems plain that whatever wrong is "
8870 "involved is fundamentally different from the wrong of direct piracy."
8874 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8875 #: freeculture.xml:6764
8877 "Professor Rubenfeld has presented a powerful constitutional argument about "
8878 "the difference that copyright law should draw (from the perspective of the "
8879 "First Amendment) between mere \"copies\" and derivative works. See Jed "
8880 "Rubenfeld, \"The Freedom of Imagination: Copyright's Constitutionality,\" "
8881 "<citetitle>Yale Law Journal</citetitle> 112 (2002): 1–60 (see "
8882 "especially pp. 53–59)."
8885 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8886 #: freeculture.xml:6759
8888 "Yet copyright law treats these two different wrongs in the same way. I can "
8889 "go to court and get an injunction against your pirating my book. I can go to "
8890 "court and get an injunction against your transformative use of my "
8891 "book.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> These two different uses of "
8892 "my creative work are treated the same."
8895 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8896 #: freeculture.xml:6775
8898 "This again may seem right to you. If I wrote a book, then why should you be "
8899 "able to write a movie that takes my story and makes money from it without "
8900 "paying me or crediting me? Or if Disney creates a creature called \"Mickey "
8901 "Mouse,\" why should you be able to make Mickey Mouse toys and be the one to "
8902 "trade on the value that Disney originally created?"
8905 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8906 #: freeculture.xml:6784
8908 "These are good arguments, and, in general, my point is not that the "
8909 "derivative right is unjustified. My aim just now is much narrower: simply to "
8910 "make clear that this expansion is a significant change from the rights "
8911 "originally granted."
8914 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
8915 #: freeculture.xml:6792
8916 msgid "Law and Architecture: Reach"
8920 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8921 #: freeculture.xml:6799
8923 "This is a simplification of the law, but not much of one. The law certainly "
8924 "regulates more than \"copies\"—a public performance of a copyrighted "
8925 "song, for example, is regulated even though performance per se doesn't make "
8926 "a copy; 17 <citetitle>United States Code</citetitle>, section 106(4). And it "
8927 "certainly sometimes doesn't regulate a \"copy\"; 17 <citetitle>United States "
8928 "Code</citetitle>, section 112(a). But the presumption under the existing law "
8929 "(which regulates \"copies;\" 17 <citetitle>United States Code</citetitle>, "
8930 "section 102) is that if there is a copy, there is a right."
8933 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8934 #: freeculture.xml:6794
8936 "Whereas originally the law regulated only publishers, the change in "
8937 "copyright's scope means that the law today regulates publishers, users, and "
8938 "authors. It regulates them because all three are capable of making copies, "
8939 "and the core of the regulation of copyright law is copies.<placeholder "
8940 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
8944 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8945 #: freeculture.xml:6811
8947 "\"Copies.\" That certainly sounds like the obvious thing for "
8948 "<emphasis>copy</emphasis>right law to regulate. But as with Jack Valenti's "
8949 "argument at the start of this chapter, that \"creative property\" deserves "
8950 "the \"same rights\" as all other property, it is the "
8951 "<emphasis>obvious</emphasis> that we need to be most careful about. For "
8952 "while it may be obvious that in the world before the Internet, copies were "
8953 "the obvious trigger for copyright law, upon reflection, it should be obvious "
8954 "that in the world with the Internet, copies should <emphasis>not</emphasis> "
8955 "be the trigger for copyright law. More precisely, they should not "
8956 "<emphasis>always</emphasis> be the trigger for copyright law."
8960 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
8961 #: freeculture.xml:6829
8963 "Thus, my argument is not that in each place that copyright law extends, we "
8964 "should repeal it. It is instead that we should have a good argument for its "
8965 "extending where it does, and should not determine its reach on the basis of "
8966 "arbitrary and automatic changes caused by technology."
8969 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8970 #: freeculture.xml:6824
8972 "This is perhaps the central claim of this book, so let me take this very "
8973 "slowly so that the point is not easily missed. My claim is that the Internet "
8974 "should at least force us to rethink the conditions under which the law of "
8975 "copyright automatically applies,<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> "
8976 "because it is clear that the current reach of copyright was never "
8977 "contemplated, much less chosen, by the legislators who enacted copyright "
8981 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
8982 #: freeculture.xml:6840
8984 "We can see this point abstractly by beginning with this largely empty "
8988 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
8989 #: freeculture.xml:6844
8990 msgid "All potential uses of a book."
8993 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
8994 #: freeculture.xml:6845
8995 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1521.png\"></graphic>"
8999 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9000 #: freeculture.xml:6849
9002 "Think about a book in real space, and imagine this circle to represent all "
9003 "its potential <emphasis>uses</emphasis>. Most of these uses are unregulated "
9004 "by copyright law, because the uses don't create a copy. If you read a book, "
9005 "that act is not regulated by copyright law. If you give someone the book, "
9006 "that act is not regulated by copyright law. If you resell a book, that act "
9007 "is not regulated (copyright law expressly states that after the first sale "
9008 "of a book, the copyright owner can impose no further conditions on the "
9009 "disposition of the book). If you sleep on the book or use it to hold up a "
9010 "lamp or let your puppy chew it up, those acts are not regulated by copyright "
9011 "law, because those acts do not make a copy."
9014 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
9015 #: freeculture.xml:6862
9016 msgid "Examples of unregulated uses of a book."
9019 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
9020 #: freeculture.xml:6863
9021 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1531.png\"></graphic>"
9024 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9025 #: freeculture.xml:6866
9027 "Obviously, however, some uses of a copyrighted book are regulated by "
9028 "copyright law. Republishing the book, for example, makes a copy. It is "
9029 "therefore regulated by copyright law. Indeed, this particular use stands at "
9030 "the core of this circle of possible uses of a copyrighted work. It is the "
9031 "paradigmatic use properly regulated by copyright regulation (see first "
9032 "diagram on next page)."
9035 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9036 #: freeculture.xml:6874
9038 "Finally, there is a tiny sliver of otherwise regulated copying uses that "
9039 "remain unregulated because the law considers these \"fair uses.\""
9042 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
9043 #: freeculture.xml:6879
9045 "Republishing stands at the core of this circle of possible uses of a "
9049 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
9050 #: freeculture.xml:6880
9051 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1541.png\"></graphic>"
9054 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9055 #: freeculture.xml:6883
9057 "These are uses that themselves involve copying, but which the law treats as "
9058 "unregulated because public policy demands that they remain unregulated. You "
9059 "are free to quote from this book, even in a review that is quite negative, "
9060 "without my permission, even though that quoting makes a copy. That copy "
9061 "would ordinarily give the copyright owner the exclusive right to say whether "
9062 "the copy is allowed or not, but the law denies the owner any exclusive right "
9063 "over such \"fair uses\" for public policy (and possibly First Amendment) "
9067 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
9068 #: freeculture.xml:6894
9069 msgid "Unregulated copying considered "fair uses.""
9072 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
9073 #: freeculture.xml:6895
9074 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1542.png\"></graphic>"
9077 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
9078 #: freeculture.xml:6899
9080 "Uses that before were presumptively unregulated are now presumptively "
9084 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
9085 #: freeculture.xml:6900
9086 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1551.png\"></graphic>"
9090 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9091 #: freeculture.xml:6904
9093 "In real space, then, the possible uses of a book are divided into three "
9094 "sorts: (1) unregulated uses, (2) regulated uses, and (3) regulated uses that "
9095 "are nonetheless deemed \"fair\" regardless of the copyright owner's views."
9099 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
9100 #: freeculture.xml:6912
9102 "I don't mean \"nature\" in the sense that it couldn't be different, but "
9103 "rather that its present instantiation entails a copy. Optical networks need "
9104 "not make copies of content they transmit, and a digital network could be "
9105 "designed to delete anything it copies so that the same number of copies "
9109 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9110 #: freeculture.xml:6909
9112 "Enter the Internet—a distributed, digital network where every use of a "
9113 "copyrighted work produces a copy.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> "
9114 "And because of this single, arbitrary feature of the design of a digital "
9115 "network, the scope of category 1 changes dramatically. Uses that before were "
9116 "presumptively unregulated are now presumptively regulated. No longer is "
9117 "there a set of presumptively unregulated uses that define a freedom "
9118 "associated with a copyrighted work. Instead, each use is now subject to the "
9119 "copyright, because each use also makes a copy—category 1 gets sucked "
9120 "into category 2. And those who would defend the unregulated uses of "
9121 "copyrighted work must look exclusively to category 3, fair uses, to bear the "
9122 "burden of this shift."
9126 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9127 #: freeculture.xml:6933
9129 "So let's be very specific to make this general point clear. Before the "
9130 "Internet, if you purchased a book and read it ten times, there would be no "
9131 "plausible <emphasis>copyright</emphasis>-related argument that the copyright "
9132 "owner could make to control that use of her book. Copyright law would have "
9133 "nothing to say about whether you read the book once, ten times, or every "
9134 "night before you went to bed. None of those instances of "
9135 "use—reading— could be regulated by copyright law because none of "
9136 "those uses produced a copy."
9139 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9140 #: freeculture.xml:6946
9142 "But the same book as an e-book is effectively governed by a different set of "
9143 "rules. Now if the copyright owner says you may read the book only once or "
9144 "only once a month, then <emphasis>copyright law</emphasis> would aid the "
9145 "copyright owner in exercising this degree of control, because of the "
9146 "accidental feature of copyright law that triggers its application upon there "
9147 "being a copy. Now if you read the book ten times and the license says you "
9148 "may read it only five times, then whenever you read the book (or any portion "
9149 "of it) beyond the fifth time, you are making a copy of the book contrary to "
9150 "the copyright owner's wish."
9153 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9154 #: freeculture.xml:6958
9156 "There are some people who think this makes perfect sense. My aim just now is "
9157 "not to argue about whether it makes sense or not. My aim is only to make "
9158 "clear the change. Once you see this point, a few other points also become "
9162 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9163 #: freeculture.xml:6964
9165 "First, making category 1 disappear is not anything any policy maker ever "
9166 "intended. Congress did not think through the collapse of the presumptively "
9167 "unregulated uses of copyrighted works. There is no evidence at all that "
9168 "policy makers had this idea in mind when they allowed our policy here to "
9169 "shift. Unregulated uses were an important part of free culture before the "
9173 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9174 #: freeculture.xml:6972
9176 "Second, this shift is especially troubling in the context of transformative "
9177 "uses of creative content. Again, we can all understand the wrong in "
9178 "commercial piracy. But the law now purports to regulate "
9179 "<emphasis>any</emphasis> transformation you make of creative work using a "
9180 "machine. \"Copy and paste\" and \"cut and paste\" become crimes. Tinkering "
9181 "with a story and releasing it to others exposes the tinkerer to at least a "
9182 "requirement of justification. However troubling the expansion with respect "
9183 "to copying a particular work, it is extraordinarily troubling with respect "
9184 "to transformative uses of creative work."
9188 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9189 #: freeculture.xml:6984
9191 "Third, this shift from category 1 to category 2 puts an extraordinary burden "
9192 "on category 3 (\"fair use\") that fair use never before had to bear. If a "
9193 "copyright owner now tried to control how many times I could read a book "
9194 "on-line, the natural response would be to argue that this is a violation of "
9195 "my fair use rights. But there has never been any litigation about whether I "
9196 "have a fair use right to read, because before the Internet, reading did not "
9197 "trigger the application of copyright law and hence the need for a fair use "
9198 "defense. The right to read was effectively protected before because reading "
9199 "was not regulated."
9202 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9203 #: freeculture.xml:6999
9205 "This point about fair use is totally ignored, even by advocates for free "
9206 "culture. We have been cornered into arguing that our rights depend upon fair "
9207 "use—never even addressing the earlier question about the expansion in "
9208 "effective regulation. A thin protection grounded in fair use makes sense "
9209 "when the vast majority of uses are <emphasis>unregulated</emphasis>. But "
9210 "when everything becomes presumptively regulated, then the protections of "
9211 "fair use are not enough."
9214 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9215 #: freeculture.xml:7009
9217 "The case of Video Pipeline is a good example. Video Pipeline was in the "
9218 "business of making \"trailer\" advertisements for movies available to video "
9219 "stores. The video stores displayed the trailers as a way to sell "
9220 "videos. Video Pipeline got the trailers from the film distributors, put the "
9221 "trailers on tape, and sold the tapes to the retail stores."
9224 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9225 #: freeculture.xml:7016
9227 "The company did this for about fifteen years. Then, in 1997, it began to "
9228 "think about the Internet as another way to distribute these previews. The "
9229 "idea was to expand their \"selling by sampling\" technique by giving on-line "
9230 "stores the same ability to enable \"browsing.\" Just as in a bookstore you "
9231 "can read a few pages of a book before you buy the book, so, too, you would "
9232 "be able to sample a bit from the movie on-line before you bought it."
9236 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9237 #: freeculture.xml:7028
9239 "In 1998, Video Pipeline informed Disney and other film distributors that it "
9240 "intended to distribute the trailers through the Internet (rather than "
9241 "sending the tapes) to distributors of their videos. Two years later, Disney "
9242 "told Video Pipeline to stop. The owner of Video Pipeline asked Disney to "
9243 "talk about the matter—he had built a business on distributing this "
9244 "content as a way to help sell Disney films; he had customers who depended "
9245 "upon his delivering this content. Disney would agree to talk only if Video "
9246 "Pipeline stopped the distribution immediately. Video Pipeline thought it "
9247 "was within their \"fair use\" rights to distribute the clips as they had. So "
9248 "they filed a lawsuit to ask the court to declare that these rights were in "
9249 "fact their rights."
9252 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9253 #: freeculture.xml:7045
9255 "Disney countersued—for $100 million in damages. Those damages were "
9256 "predicated upon a claim that Video Pipeline had \"willfully infringed\" on "
9257 "Disney's copyright. When a court makes a finding of willful infringement, it "
9258 "can award damages not on the basis of the actual harm to the copyright "
9259 "owner, but on the basis of an amount set in the statute. Because Video "
9260 "Pipeline had distributed seven hundred clips of Disney movies to enable "
9261 "video stores to sell copies of those movies, Disney was now suing Video "
9262 "Pipeline for $100 million."
9265 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9266 #: freeculture.xml:7057
9268 "Disney has the right to control its property, of course. But the video "
9269 "stores that were selling Disney's films also had some sort of right to be "
9270 "able to sell the films that they had bought from Disney. Disney's claim in "
9271 "court was that the stores were allowed to sell the films and they were "
9272 "permitted to list the titles of the films they were selling, but they were "
9273 "not allowed to show clips of the films as a way of selling them without "
9274 "Disney's permission."
9277 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9278 #: freeculture.xml:7066
9280 "Now, you might think this is a close case, and I think the courts would "
9281 "consider it a close case. My point here is to map the change that gives "
9282 "Disney this power. Before the Internet, Disney couldn't really control how "
9283 "people got access to their content. Once a video was in the marketplace, the "
9284 "\"first-sale doctrine\" would free the seller to use the video as he wished, "
9285 "including showing portions of it in order to engender sales of the entire "
9286 "movie video. But with the Internet, it becomes possible for Disney to "
9287 "centralize control over access to this content. Because each use of the "
9288 "Internet produces a copy, use on the Internet becomes subject to the "
9289 "copyright owner's control. The technology expands the scope of effective "
9290 "control, because the technology builds a copy into every transaction."
9294 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9295 #: freeculture.xml:7081
9297 "No doubt, a potential is not yet an abuse, and so the potential for control "
9298 "is not yet the abuse of control. Barnes & Noble has the right to say you "
9299 "can't touch a book in their store; property law gives them that right. But "
9300 "the market effectively protects against that abuse. If Barnes & Noble "
9301 "banned browsing, then consumers would choose other bookstores. Competition "
9302 "protects against the extremes. And it may well be (my argument so far does "
9303 "not even question this) that competition would prevent any similar danger "
9304 "when it comes to copyright. Sure, publishers exercising the rights that "
9305 "authors have assigned to them might try to regulate how many times you read "
9306 "a book, or try to stop you from sharing the book with anyone. But in a "
9307 "competitive market such as the book market, the dangers of this happening "
9311 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9312 #: freeculture.xml:7096
9314 "Again, my aim so far is simply to map the changes that this changed "
9315 "architecture enables. Enabling technology to enforce the control of "
9316 "copyright means that the control of copyright is no longer defined by "
9317 "balanced policy. The control of copyright is simply what private owners "
9318 "choose. In some contexts, at least, that fact is harmless. But in some "
9319 "contexts it is a recipe for disaster."
9322 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
9323 #: freeculture.xml:7105
9324 msgid "Architecture and Law: Force"
9327 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9328 #: freeculture.xml:7107
9330 "The disappearance of unregulated uses would be change enough, but a second "
9331 "important change brought about by the Internet magnifies its "
9332 "significance. This second change does not affect the reach of copyright "
9333 "regulation; it affects how such regulation is enforced."
9336 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9337 #: freeculture.xml:7113
9339 "In the world before digital technology, it was generally the law that "
9340 "controlled whether and how someone was regulated by copyright law. The law, "
9341 "meaning a court, meaning a judge: In the end, it was a human, trained in the "
9342 "tradition of the law and cognizant of the balances that tradition embraced, "
9343 "who said whether and how the law would restrict your freedom."
9346 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
9347 #: freeculture.xml:7120
9351 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
9352 #: freeculture.xml:7122 freeculture.xml:7292
9353 msgid "Marx Brothers"
9357 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
9358 #: freeculture.xml:7135
9360 "See David Lange, \"Recognizing the Public Domain,\" <citetitle>Law and "
9361 "Contemporary Problems</citetitle> 44 (1981): 172–73."
9364 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9365 #: freeculture.xml:7128
9367 "There's a famous story about a battle between the Marx Brothers and Warner "
9368 "Brothers. The Marxes intended to make a parody of "
9369 "<citetitle>Casablanca</citetitle>. Warner Brothers objected. They wrote a "
9370 "nasty letter to the Marxes, warning them that there would be serious legal "
9371 "consequences if they went forward with their plan.<placeholder "
9372 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
9375 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
9376 #: freeculture.xml:7144
9378 "Ibid. See also Vaidhyanathan, <citetitle>Copyrights and "
9379 "Copywrongs</citetitle>, 1–3. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
9383 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9384 #: freeculture.xml:7140
9386 "This led the Marx Brothers to respond in kind. They warned Warner Brothers "
9387 "that the Marx Brothers \"were brothers long before you were.\"<placeholder "
9388 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The Marx Brothers therefore owned the word "
9389 "<citetitle>brothers</citetitle>, and if Warner Brothers insisted on trying "
9390 "to control <citetitle>Casablanca</citetitle>, then the Marx Brothers would "
9391 "insist on control over <citetitle>brothers</citetitle>."
9394 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9395 #: freeculture.xml:7152
9397 "An absurd and hollow threat, of course, because Warner Brothers, like the "
9398 "Marx Brothers, knew that no court would ever enforce such a silly "
9399 "claim. This extremism was irrelevant to the real freedoms anyone (including "
9400 "Warner Brothers) enjoyed."
9403 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9404 #: freeculture.xml:7158
9406 "On the Internet, however, there is no check on silly rules, because on the "
9407 "Internet, increasingly, rules are enforced not by a human but by a machine: "
9408 "Increasingly, the rules of copyright law, as interpreted by the copyright "
9409 "owner, get built into the technology that delivers copyrighted content. It "
9410 "is code, rather than law, that rules. And the problem with code regulations "
9411 "is that, unlike law, code has no shame. Code would not get the humor of the "
9412 "Marx Brothers. The consequence of that is not at all funny."
9415 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9416 #: freeculture.xml:7170
9417 msgid "Consider the life of my Adobe eBook Reader."
9420 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9421 #: freeculture.xml:7173
9423 "An e-book is a book delivered in electronic form. An Adobe eBook is not a "
9424 "book that Adobe has published; Adobe simply produces the software that "
9425 "publishers use to deliver e-books. It provides the technology, and the "
9426 "publisher delivers the content by using the technology."
9429 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9430 #: freeculture.xml:7180
9431 msgid "On the next page is a picture of an old version of my Adobe eBook Reader."
9435 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9436 #: freeculture.xml:7184
9438 "As you can see, I have a small collection of e-books within this e-book "
9439 "library. Some of these books reproduce content that is in the public domain: "
9440 "<citetitle>Middlemarch</citetitle>, for example, is in the public domain. "
9441 "Some of them reproduce content that is not in the public domain: My own book "
9442 "<citetitle>The Future of Ideas</citetitle> is not yet within the public "
9443 "domain. Consider <citetitle>Middlemarch</citetitle> first. If you click on "
9444 "my e-book copy of <citetitle>Middlemarch</citetitle>, you'll see a fancy "
9445 "cover, and then a button at the bottom called Permissions."
9448 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
9449 #: freeculture.xml:7195
9450 msgid "Picture of an old version of Adobe eBook Reader"
9453 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
9454 #: freeculture.xml:7196
9455 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1611.png\"></graphic>"
9458 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9459 #: freeculture.xml:7199
9461 "If you click on the Permissions button, you'll see a list of the permissions "
9462 "that the publisher purports to grant with this book."
9465 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
9466 #: freeculture.xml:7203
9467 msgid "List of the permissions that the publisher purports to grant."
9470 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
9471 #: freeculture.xml:7204
9472 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1612.png\"></graphic>"
9476 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9477 #: freeculture.xml:7208
9479 "According to my eBook Reader, I have the permission to copy to the clipboard "
9480 "of the computer ten text selections every ten days. (So far, I've copied no "
9481 "text to the clipboard.) I also have the permission to print ten pages from "
9482 "the book every ten days. Lastly, I have the permission to use the Read Aloud "
9483 "button to hear <citetitle>Middlemarch</citetitle> read aloud through the "
9487 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
9488 #: freeculture.xml:7218
9492 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
9493 #: freeculture.xml:7219
9494 msgid "<citetitle>Politics</citetitle>, (Aristotle)"
9497 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9498 #: freeculture.xml:7216
9500 "Here's the e-book for another work in the public domain (including the "
9501 "translation): Aristotle's <citetitle>Politics</citetitle>. <placeholder "
9502 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
9505 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
9506 #: freeculture.xml:7222
9507 msgid "E-book of Aristotle;s "Politics""
9510 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
9511 #: freeculture.xml:7223
9512 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1621.png\"></graphic>"
9515 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9516 #: freeculture.xml:7226
9518 "According to its permissions, no printing or copying is permitted at "
9519 "all. But fortunately, you can use the Read Aloud button to hear the book."
9522 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
9523 #: freeculture.xml:7231
9524 msgid "List of the permissions for Aristotle;s "Politics"."
9527 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
9528 #: freeculture.xml:7232
9529 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1622.png\"></graphic>"
9532 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9533 #: freeculture.xml:7235
9535 "Finally (and most embarrassingly), here are the permissions for the original "
9536 "e-book version of my last book, <citetitle>The Future of Ideas</citetitle>:"
9539 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
9540 #: freeculture.xml:7241
9541 msgid "List of the permissions for "The Future of Ideas"."
9544 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
9545 #: freeculture.xml:7242
9546 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1631.png\"></graphic>"
9549 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9550 #: freeculture.xml:7245
9551 msgid "No copying, no printing, and don't you dare try to listen to this book!"
9555 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
9556 #: freeculture.xml:7255
9558 "In principle, a contract might impose a requirement on me. I might, for "
9559 "example, buy a book from you that includes a contract that says I will read "
9560 "it only three times, or that I promise to read it three times. But that "
9561 "obligation (and the limits for creating that obligation) would come from the "
9562 "contract, not from copyright law, and the obligations of contract would not "
9563 "necessarily pass to anyone who subsequently acquired the book."
9566 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9567 #: freeculture.xml:7248
9569 "Now, the Adobe eBook Reader calls these controls \"permissions\"— as "
9570 "if the publisher has the power to control how you use these works. For "
9571 "works under copyright, the copyright owner certainly does have the "
9572 "power—up to the limits of the copyright law. But for work not under "
9573 "copyright, there is no such copyright power.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
9574 "id=\"0\"/> When my e-book of <citetitle>Middlemarch</citetitle> says I have "
9575 "the permission to copy only ten text selections into the memory every ten "
9576 "days, what that really means is that the eBook Reader has enabled the "
9577 "publisher to control how I use the book on my computer, far beyond the "
9578 "control that the law would enable."
9581 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9582 #: freeculture.xml:7270
9584 "The control comes instead from the code—from the technology within "
9585 "which the e-book \"lives.\" Though the e-book says that these are "
9586 "permissions, they are not the sort of \"permissions\" that most of us deal "
9587 "with. When a teenager gets \"permission\" to stay out till midnight, she "
9588 "knows (unless she's Cinderella) that she can stay out till 2 A.M., but will "
9589 "suffer a punishment if she's caught. But when the Adobe eBook Reader says I "
9590 "have the permission to make ten copies of the text into the computer's "
9591 "memory, that means that after I've made ten copies, the computer will not "
9592 "make any more. The same with the printing restrictions: After ten pages, the "
9593 "eBook Reader will not print any more pages. It's the same with the silly "
9594 "restriction that says that you can't use the Read Aloud button to read my "
9595 "book aloud—it's not that the company will sue you if you do; instead, "
9596 "if you push the Read Aloud button with my book, the machine simply won't "
9600 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9601 #: freeculture.xml:7288
9603 "These are <emphasis>controls</emphasis>, not permissions. Imagine a world "
9604 "where the Marx Brothers sold word processing software that, when you tried "
9605 "to type \"Warner Brothers,\" erased \"Brothers\" from the sentence. "
9606 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
9609 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9610 #: freeculture.xml:7295
9612 "This is the future of copyright law: not so much copyright "
9613 "<emphasis>law</emphasis> as copyright <emphasis>code</emphasis>. The "
9614 "controls over access to content will not be controls that are ratified by "
9615 "courts; the controls over access to content will be controls that are coded "
9616 "by programmers. And whereas the controls that are built into the law are "
9617 "always to be checked by a judge, the controls that are built into the "
9618 "technology have no similar built-in check."
9621 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9622 #: freeculture.xml:7304
9624 "How significant is this? Isn't it always possible to get around the controls "
9625 "built into the technology? Software used to be sold with technologies that "
9626 "limited the ability of users to copy the software, but those were trivial "
9627 "protections to defeat. Why won't it be trivial to defeat these protections "
9631 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9632 #: freeculture.xml:7311
9634 "We've only scratched the surface of this story. Return to the Adobe eBook "
9638 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9639 #: freeculture.xml:7315
9641 "Early in the life of the Adobe eBook Reader, Adobe suffered a public "
9642 "relations nightmare. Among the books that you could download for free on the "
9643 "Adobe site was a copy of <citetitle>Alice's Adventures in "
9644 "Wonderland</citetitle>. This wonderful book is in the public domain. Yet "
9645 "when you clicked on Permissions for that book, you got the following report:"
9648 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
9649 #: freeculture.xml:7323
9650 msgid "List of the permissions for "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"."
9653 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
9654 #: freeculture.xml:7325
9655 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1641.png\"></graphic>"
9659 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9660 #: freeculture.xml:7329
9662 "Here was a public domain children's book that you were not allowed to copy, "
9663 "not allowed to lend, not allowed to give, and, as the \"permissions\" "
9664 "indicated, not allowed to \"read aloud\"!"
9667 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9668 #: freeculture.xml:7336
9670 "The public relations nightmare attached to that final permission. For the "
9671 "text did not say that you were not permitted to use the Read Aloud button; "
9672 "it said you did not have the permission to read the book aloud. That led "
9673 "some people to think that Adobe was restricting the right of parents, for "
9674 "example, to read the book to their children, which seemed, to say the least, "
9678 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9679 #: freeculture.xml:7344
9681 "Adobe responded quickly that it was absurd to think that it was trying to "
9682 "restrict the right to read a book aloud. Obviously it was only restricting "
9683 "the ability to use the Read Aloud button to have the book read aloud. But "
9684 "the question Adobe never did answer is this: Would Adobe thus agree that a "
9685 "consumer was free to use software to hack around the restrictions built into "
9686 "the eBook Reader? If some company (call it Elcomsoft) developed a program to "
9687 "disable the technological protection built into an Adobe eBook so that a "
9688 "blind person, say, could use a computer to read the book aloud, would Adobe "
9689 "agree that such a use of an eBook Reader was fair? Adobe didn't answer "
9690 "because the answer, however absurd it might seem, is no."
9693 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9694 #: freeculture.xml:7357
9696 "The point is not to blame Adobe. Indeed, Adobe is among the most innovative "
9697 "companies developing strategies to balance open access to content with "
9698 "incentives for companies to innovate. But Adobe's technology enables "
9699 "control, and Adobe has an incentive to defend this control. That incentive "
9700 "is understandable, yet what it creates is often crazy."
9703 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9704 #: freeculture.xml:7365
9706 "To see the point in a particularly absurd context, consider a favorite story "
9707 "of mine that makes the same point."
9710 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
9711 #: freeculture.xml:7369
9712 msgid "Aibo robotic dog"
9715 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9716 #: freeculture.xml:7372
9718 "Consider the robotic dog made by Sony named \"Aibo.\" The Aibo learns "
9719 "tricks, cuddles, and follows you around. It eats only electricity and that "
9720 "doesn't leave that much of a mess (at least in your house)."
9724 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9725 #: freeculture.xml:7377
9727 "The Aibo is expensive and popular. Fans from around the world have set up "
9728 "clubs to trade stories. One fan in particular set up a Web site to enable "
9729 "information about the Aibo dog to be shared. This fan set up aibopet.com "
9730 "(and aibohack.com, but that resolves to the same site), and on that site he "
9731 "provided information about how to teach an Aibo to do tricks in addition to "
9732 "the ones Sony had taught it."
9735 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9736 #: freeculture.xml:7386
9738 "\"Teach\" here has a special meaning. Aibos are just cute computers. You "
9739 "teach a computer how to do something by programming it differently. So to "
9740 "say that aibopet.com was giving information about how to teach the dog to do "
9741 "new tricks is just to say that aibopet.com was giving information to users "
9742 "of the Aibo pet about how to hack their computer \"dog\" to make it do new "
9743 "tricks (thus, aibohack.com)."
9746 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9747 #: freeculture.xml:7394
9749 "If you're not a programmer or don't know many programmers, the word "
9750 "<citetitle>hack</citetitle> has a particularly unfriendly "
9751 "connotation. Nonprogrammers hack bushes or weeds. Nonprogrammers in horror "
9752 "movies do even worse. But to programmers, or coders, as I call them, "
9753 "<citetitle>hack</citetitle> is a much more positive "
9754 "term. <citetitle>Hack</citetitle> just means code that enables the program "
9755 "to do something it wasn't originally intended or enabled to do. If you buy a "
9756 "new printer for an old computer, you might find the old computer doesn't "
9757 "run, or \"drive,\" the printer. If you discovered that, you'd later be happy "
9758 "to discover a hack on the Net by someone who has written a driver to enable "
9759 "the computer to drive the printer you just bought."
9762 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9763 #: freeculture.xml:7406
9765 "Some hacks are easy. Some are unbelievably hard. Hackers as a community like "
9766 "to challenge themselves and others with increasingly difficult "
9767 "tasks. There's a certain respect that goes with the talent to hack "
9768 "well. There's a well-deserved respect that goes with the talent to hack "
9772 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9773 #: freeculture.xml:7413
9775 "The Aibo fan was displaying a bit of both when he hacked the program and "
9776 "offered to the world a bit of code that would enable the Aibo to dance "
9777 "jazz. The dog wasn't programmed to dance jazz. It was a clever bit of "
9778 "tinkering that turned the dog into a more talented creature than Sony had "
9783 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9784 #: freeculture.xml:7421
9786 "I've told this story in many contexts, both inside and outside the United "
9787 "States. Once I was asked by a puzzled member of the audience, is it "
9788 "permissible for a dog to dance jazz in the United States? We forget that "
9789 "stories about the backcountry still flow across much of the world. So let's "
9790 "just be clear before we continue: It's not a crime anywhere (anymore) to "
9791 "dance jazz. Nor is it a crime to teach your dog to dance jazz. Nor should it "
9792 "be a crime (though we don't have a lot to go on here) to teach your robot "
9793 "dog to dance jazz. Dancing jazz is a completely legal activity. One imagines "
9794 "that the owner of aibopet.com thought, <emphasis>What possible problem could "
9795 "there be with teaching a robot dog to dance?</emphasis>"
9798 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9799 #: freeculture.xml:7437
9801 "Let's put the dog to sleep for a minute, and turn to a pony show— not "
9802 "literally a pony show, but rather a paper that a Princeton academic named Ed "
9803 "Felten prepared for a conference. This Princeton academic is well known and "
9804 "respected. He was hired by the government in the Microsoft case to test "
9805 "Microsoft's claims about what could and could not be done with its own "
9806 "code. In that trial, he demonstrated both his brilliance and his "
9807 "coolness. Under heavy badgering by Microsoft lawyers, Ed Felten stood his "
9808 "ground. He was not about to be bullied into being silent about something he "
9812 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
9813 #: freeculture.xml:7460 freeculture.xml:9887
9814 msgid "Electronic Frontier Foundation"
9817 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
9818 #: freeculture.xml:7450
9820 "See Pamela Samuelson, \"Anticircumvention Rules: Threat to Science,\" "
9821 "<citetitle>Science</citetitle> 293 (2001): 2028; Brendan I. Koerner, \"Play "
9822 "Dead: Sony Muzzles the Techies Who Teach a Robot Dog New Tricks,\" "
9823 "<citetitle>American Prospect</citetitle>, January 2002; \"Court Dismisses "
9824 "Computer Scientists' Challenge to DMCA,\" <citetitle>Intellectual Property "
9825 "Litigation Reporter</citetitle>, 11 December 2001; Bill Holland, \"Copyright "
9826 "Act Raising Free-Speech Concerns,\" <citetitle>Billboard</citetitle>, May "
9827 "2001; Janelle Brown, \"Is the RIAA Running Scared?\" Salon.com, April 2001; "
9828 "Electronic Frontier Foundation, \"Frequently Asked Questions about "
9829 "<citetitle>Felten and USENIX</citetitle> v. <citetitle>RIAA</citetitle> "
9830 "Legal Case,\" available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
9831 "#27</ulink>. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
9834 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9835 #: freeculture.xml:7448
9837 "But Felten's bravery was really tested in April 2001.<placeholder "
9838 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> He and a group of colleagues were working on a "
9839 "paper to be submitted at conference. The paper was intended to describe the "
9840 "weakness in an encryption system being developed by the Secure Digital Music "
9841 "Initiative as a technique to control the distribution of music."
9844 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9845 #: freeculture.xml:7468
9847 "The SDMI coalition had as its goal a technology to enable content owners to "
9848 "exercise much better control over their content than the Internet, as it "
9849 "originally stood, granted them. Using encryption, SDMI hoped to develop a "
9850 "standard that would allow the content owner to say \"this music cannot be "
9851 "copied,\" and have a computer respect that command. The technology was to "
9852 "be part of a \"trusted system\" of control that would get content owners to "
9853 "trust the system of the Internet much more."
9856 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9857 #: freeculture.xml:7478
9859 "When SDMI thought it was close to a standard, it set up a competition. In "
9860 "exchange for providing contestants with the code to an SDMI-encrypted bit of "
9861 "content, contestants were to try to crack it and, if they did, report the "
9862 "problems to the consortium."
9866 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9867 #: freeculture.xml:7485
9869 "Felten and his team figured out the encryption system quickly. He and the "
9870 "team saw the weakness of this system as a type: Many encryption systems "
9871 "would suffer the same weakness, and Felten and his team thought it "
9872 "worthwhile to point this out to those who study encryption."
9875 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9876 #: freeculture.xml:7491
9878 "Let's review just what Felten was doing. Again, this is the United "
9879 "States. We have a principle of free speech. We have this principle not just "
9880 "because it is the law, but also because it is a really great idea. A "
9881 "strongly protected tradition of free speech is likely to encourage a wide "
9882 "range of criticism. That criticism is likely, in turn, to improve the "
9883 "systems or people or ideas criticized."
9886 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9887 #: freeculture.xml:7499
9889 "What Felten and his colleagues were doing was publishing a paper describing "
9890 "the weakness in a technology. They were not spreading free music, or "
9891 "building and deploying this technology. The paper was an academic essay, "
9892 "unintelligible to most people. But it clearly showed the weakness in the "
9893 "SDMI system, and why SDMI would not, as presently constituted, succeed."
9896 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9897 #: freeculture.xml:7507
9899 "What links these two, aibopet.com and Felten, is the letters they then "
9900 "received. Aibopet.com received a letter from Sony about the aibopet.com "
9901 "hack. Though a jazz-dancing dog is perfectly legal, Sony wrote:"
9904 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
9905 #: freeculture.xml:7514
9907 "Your site contains information providing the means to circumvent AIBO-ware's "
9908 "copy protection protocol constituting a violation of the anti-circumvention "
9909 "provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act."
9912 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9913 #: freeculture.xml:7520
9915 "And though an academic paper describing the weakness in a system of "
9916 "encryption should also be perfectly legal, Felten received a letter from an "
9917 "RIAA lawyer that read:"
9921 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
9922 #: freeculture.xml:7526
9924 "Any disclosure of information gained from participating in the Public "
9925 "Challenge would be outside the scope of activities permitted by the "
9926 "Agreement and could subject you and your research team to actions under the "
9927 "Digital Millennium Copyright Act (\"DMCA\")."
9930 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9931 #: freeculture.xml:7534
9933 "In both cases, this weirdly Orwellian law was invoked to control the spread "
9934 "of information. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act made spreading such "
9935 "information an offense."
9938 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9939 #: freeculture.xml:7539
9941 "The DMCA was enacted as a response to copyright owners' first fear about "
9942 "cyberspace. The fear was that copyright control was effectively dead; the "
9943 "response was to find technologies that might compensate. These new "
9944 "technologies would be copyright protection technologies— technologies "
9945 "to control the replication and distribution of copyrighted material. They "
9946 "were designed as <emphasis>code</emphasis> to modify the original "
9947 "<emphasis>code</emphasis> of the Internet, to reestablish some protection "
9948 "for copyright owners."
9951 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9952 #: freeculture.xml:7550
9954 "The DMCA was a bit of law intended to back up the protection of this code "
9955 "designed to protect copyrighted material. It was, we could say, "
9956 "<emphasis>legal code</emphasis> intended to buttress <emphasis>software "
9957 "code</emphasis> which itself was intended to support the <emphasis>legal "
9958 "code of copyright</emphasis>."
9961 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9962 #: freeculture.xml:7557
9964 "But the DMCA was not designed merely to protect copyrighted works to the "
9965 "extent copyright law protected them. Its protection, that is, did not end at "
9966 "the line that copyright law drew. The DMCA regulated devices that were "
9967 "designed to circumvent copyright protection measures. It was designed to ban "
9968 "those devices, whether or not the use of the copyrighted material made "
9969 "possible by that circumvention would have been a copyright violation."
9973 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9974 #: freeculture.xml:7566
9976 "Aibopet.com and Felten make the point. The Aibo hack circumvented a "
9977 "copyright protection system for the purpose of enabling the dog to dance "
9978 "jazz. That enablement no doubt involved the use of copyrighted material. But "
9979 "as aibopet.com's site was noncommercial, and the use did not enable "
9980 "subsequent copyright infringements, there's no doubt that aibopet.com's hack "
9981 "was fair use of Sony's copyrighted material. Yet fair use is not a defense "
9982 "to the DMCA. The question is not whether the use of the copyrighted material "
9983 "was a copyright violation. The question is whether a copyright protection "
9984 "system was circumvented."
9987 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9988 #: freeculture.xml:7578
9990 "The threat against Felten was more attenuated, but it followed the same line "
9991 "of reasoning. By publishing a paper describing how a copyright protection "
9992 "system could be circumvented, the RIAA lawyer suggested, Felten himself was "
9993 "distributing a circumvention technology. Thus, even though he was not "
9994 "himself infringing anyone's copyright, his academic paper was enabling "
9995 "others to infringe others' copyright."
9998 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
9999 #: freeculture.xml:7586
10001 "The bizarreness of these arguments is captured in a cartoon drawn in 1981 by "
10002 "Paul Conrad. At that time, a court in California had held that the VCR could "
10003 "be banned because it was a copyright-infringing technology: It enabled "
10004 "consumers to copy films without the permission of the copyright owner. No "
10005 "doubt there were uses of the technology that were legal: Fred Rogers, aka "
10006 "\"<citetitle>Mr. Rogers</citetitle>,\" for example, had testified in that "
10007 "case that he wanted people to feel free to tape Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood."
10011 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
10012 #: freeculture.xml:7612
10014 "<citetitle>Sony Corporation of America</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Universal "
10015 "City Studios, Inc</citetitle>., 464 U.S. 417, 455 fn. 27 (1984). Rogers "
10016 "never changed his view about the VCR. See James Lardner, <citetitle>Fast "
10017 "Forward: Hollywood, the Japanese, and the Onslaught of the VCR</citetitle> "
10018 "(New York: W. W. Norton, 1987), 270–71."
10021 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
10022 #: freeculture.xml:7597
10024 "Some public stations, as well as commercial stations, program the "
10025 "\"Neighborhood\" at hours when some children cannot use it. I think that "
10026 "it's a real service to families to be able to record such programs and show "
10027 "them at appropriate times. I have always felt that with the advent of all of "
10028 "this new technology that allows people to tape the \"Neighborhood\" "
10029 "off-the-air, and I'm speaking for the \"Neighborhood\" because that's what I "
10030 "produce, that they then become much more active in the programming of their "
10031 "family's television life. Very frankly, I am opposed to people being "
10032 "programmed by others. My whole approach in broadcasting has always been "
10033 "\"You are an important person just the way you are. You can make healthy "
10034 "decisions.\" Maybe I'm going on too long, but I just feel that anything that "
10035 "allows a person to be more active in the control of his or her life, in a "
10036 "healthy way, is important.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
10040 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10041 #: freeculture.xml:7621
10043 "Even though there were uses that were legal, because there were some uses "
10044 "that were illegal, the court held the companies producing the VCR "
10048 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10049 #: freeculture.xml:7626
10050 msgid "This led Conrad to draw the cartoon below, which we can adopt to the DMCA."
10053 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10054 #: freeculture.xml:7630
10055 msgid "No argument I have can top this picture, but let me try to get close."
10058 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10059 #: freeculture.xml:7633
10061 "The anticircumvention provisions of the DMCA target copyright circumvention "
10062 "technologies. Circumvention technologies can be used for different "
10063 "ends. They can be used, for example, to enable massive pirating of "
10064 "copyrighted material—a bad end. Or they can be used to enable the use "
10065 "of particular copyrighted materials in ways that would be considered fair "
10066 "use—a good end."
10070 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10071 #: freeculture.xml:7641
10073 "A handgun can be used to shoot a police officer or a child. Most would agree "
10074 "such a use is bad. Or a handgun can be used for target practice or to "
10075 "protect against an intruder. At least some would say that such a use would "
10076 "be good. It, too, is a technology that has both good and bad uses."
10079 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
10080 #: freeculture.xml:7649
10081 msgid "VCR/handgun cartoon."
10084 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
10085 #: freeculture.xml:7650
10086 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1711.png\"></graphic>"
10089 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10090 #: freeculture.xml:7653
10092 "The obvious point of Conrad's cartoon is the weirdness of a world where guns "
10093 "are legal, despite the harm they can do, while VCRs (and circumvention "
10094 "technologies) are illegal. Flash: <emphasis>No one ever died from copyright "
10095 "circumvention</emphasis>. Yet the law bans circumvention technologies "
10096 "absolutely, despite the potential that they might do some good, but permits "
10097 "guns, despite the obvious and tragic harm they do."
10100 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10101 #: freeculture.xml:7661
10103 "The Aibo and RIAA examples demonstrate how copyright owners are changing the "
10104 "balance that copyright law grants. Using code, copyright owners restrict "
10105 "fair use; using the DMCA, they punish those who would attempt to evade the "
10106 "restrictions on fair use that they impose through code. Technology becomes a "
10107 "means by which fair use can be erased; the law of the DMCA backs up that "
10111 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10112 #: freeculture.xml:7669
10114 "This is how <emphasis>code</emphasis> becomes <emphasis>law</emphasis>. The "
10115 "controls built into the technology of copy and access protection become "
10116 "rules the violation of which is also a violation of the law. In this way, "
10117 "the code extends the law—increasing its regulation, even if the "
10118 "subject it regulates (activities that would otherwise plainly constitute "
10119 "fair use) is beyond the reach of the law. Code becomes law; code extends the "
10120 "law; code thus extends the control that copyright owners effect—at "
10121 "least for those copyright holders with the lawyers who can write the nasty "
10122 "letters that Felten and aibopet.com received."
10125 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10126 #: freeculture.xml:7681
10128 "There is one final aspect of the interaction between architecture and law "
10129 "that contributes to the force of copyright's regulation. This is the ease "
10130 "with which infringements of the law can be detected. For contrary to the "
10131 "rhetoric common at the birth of cyberspace that on the Internet, no one "
10132 "knows you're a dog, increasingly, given changing technologies deployed on "
10133 "the Internet, it is easy to find the dog who committed a legal wrong. The "
10134 "technologies of the Internet are open to snoops as well as sharers, and the "
10135 "snoops are increasingly good at tracking down the identity of those who "
10136 "violate the rules."
10140 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
10141 #: freeculture.xml:7700
10143 "For an early and prescient analysis, see Rebecca Tushnet, \"Legal Fictions, "
10144 "Copyright, Fan Fiction, and a New Common Law,\" <citetitle>Loyola of Los "
10145 "Angeles Entertainment Law Journal</citetitle> 17 (1997): 651."
10148 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10149 #: freeculture.xml:7694
10151 "For example, imagine you were part of a <citetitle>Star Trek</citetitle> fan "
10152 "club. You gathered every month to share trivia, and maybe to enact a kind of "
10153 "fan fiction about the show. One person would play Spock, another, Captain "
10154 "Kirk. The characters would begin with a plot from a real story, then simply "
10155 "continue it.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
10158 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10159 #: freeculture.xml:7706
10161 "Before the Internet, this was, in effect, a totally unregulated activity. "
10162 "No matter what happened inside your club room, you would never be interfered "
10163 "with by the copyright police. You were free in that space to do as you "
10164 "wished with this part of our culture. You were allowed to build on it as you "
10165 "wished without fear of legal control."
10168 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10169 #: freeculture.xml:7713
10171 "But if you moved your club onto the Internet, and made it generally "
10172 "available for others to join, the story would be very different. Bots "
10173 "scouring the Net for trademark and copyright infringement would quickly find "
10174 "your site. Your posting of fan fiction, depending upon the ownership of the "
10175 "series that you're depicting, could well inspire a lawyer's threat. And "
10176 "ignoring the lawyer's threat would be extremely costly indeed. The law of "
10177 "copyright is extremely efficient. The penalties are severe, and the process "
10181 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10182 #: freeculture.xml:7723
10184 "This change in the effective force of the law is caused by a change in the "
10185 "ease with which the law can be enforced. That change too shifts the law's "
10186 "balance radically. It is as if your car transmitted the speed at which you "
10187 "traveled at every moment that you drove; that would be just one step before "
10188 "the state started issuing tickets based upon the data you transmitted. That "
10189 "is, in effect, what is happening here."
10192 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
10193 #: freeculture.xml:7732
10194 msgid "Market: Concentration"
10198 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10199 #: freeculture.xml:7734
10201 "So copyright's duration has increased dramatically—tripled in the past "
10202 "thirty years. And copyright's scope has increased as well—from "
10203 "regulating only publishers to now regulating just about everyone. And "
10204 "copyright's reach has changed, as every action becomes a copy and hence "
10205 "presumptively regulated. And as technologists find better ways to control "
10206 "the use of content, and as copyright is increasingly enforced through "
10207 "technology, copyright's force changes, too. Misuse is easier to find and "
10208 "easier to control. This regulation of the creative process, which began as a "
10209 "tiny regulation governing a tiny part of the market for creative work, has "
10210 "become the single most important regulator of creativity there is. It is a "
10211 "massive expansion in the scope of the government's control over innovation "
10212 "and creativity; it would be totally unrecognizable to those who gave birth "
10213 "to copyright's control."
10216 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10217 #: freeculture.xml:7752
10219 "Still, in my view, all of these changes would not matter much if it weren't "
10220 "for one more change that we must also consider. This is a change that is in "
10221 "some sense the most familiar, though its significance and scope are not well "
10222 "understood. It is the one that creates precisely the reason to be concerned "
10223 "about all the other changes I have described."
10226 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10227 #: freeculture.xml:7759
10229 "This is the change in the concentration and integration of the media. In "
10230 "the past twenty years, the nature of media ownership has undergone a radical "
10231 "alteration, caused by changes in legal rules governing the media. Before "
10232 "this change happened, the different forms of media were owned by separate "
10233 "media companies. Now, the media is increasingly owned by only a few "
10234 "companies. Indeed, after the changes that the FCC announced in June 2003, "
10235 "most expect that within a few years, we will live in a world where just "
10236 "three companies control more than percent of the media."
10239 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10240 #: freeculture.xml:7770
10241 msgid "These changes are of two sorts: the scope of concentration, and its nature."
10244 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
10245 #: freeculture.xml:7773
10250 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
10251 #: freeculture.xml:7779
10253 "FCC Oversight: Hearing Before the Senate Commerce, Science and "
10254 "Transportation Committee, 108th Cong., 1st sess. (22 May 2003) (statement "
10255 "of Senator John McCain)."
10259 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
10260 #: freeculture.xml:7786
10262 "Lynette Holloway, \"Despite a Marketing Blitz, CD Sales Continue to Slide,\" "
10263 "<citetitle>New York Times</citetitle>, 23 December 2002."
10267 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
10268 #: freeculture.xml:7792
10270 "Molly Ivins, \"Media Consolidation Must Be Stopped,\" <citetitle>Charleston "
10271 "Gazette</citetitle>, 31 May 2003."
10274 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
10275 #: freeculture.xml:7795
10276 msgid "McCain, John"
10279 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10280 #: freeculture.xml:7775
10282 "Changes in scope are the easier ones to describe. As Senator John McCain "
10283 "summarized the data produced in the FCC's review of media ownership, \"five "
10284 "companies control 85 percent of our media sources.\"<placeholder "
10285 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The five recording labels of Universal Music "
10286 "Group, BMG, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music Group, and EMI control "
10287 "84.8 percent of the U.S. music market.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
10288 "id=\"1\"/> The \"five largest cable companies pipe programming to 74 percent "
10289 "of the cable subscribers nationwide.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
10290 "id=\"2\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"3\"/>"
10294 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10295 #: freeculture.xml:7798
10297 "The story with radio is even more dramatic. Before deregulation, the "
10298 "nation's largest radio broadcasting conglomerate owned fewer than "
10299 "seventy-five stations. Today <emphasis>one</emphasis> company owns more than "
10300 "1,200 stations. During that period of consolidation, the total number of "
10301 "radio owners dropped by 34 percent. Today, in most markets, the two largest "
10302 "broadcasters control 74 percent of that market's revenues. Overall, just "
10303 "four companies control 90 percent of the nation's radio advertising "
10307 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10308 #: freeculture.xml:7809
10310 "Newspaper ownership is becoming more concentrated as well. Today, there are "
10311 "six hundred fewer daily newspapers in the United States than there were "
10312 "eighty years ago, and ten companies control half of the nation's "
10313 "circulation. There are twenty major newspaper publishers in the United "
10314 "States. The top ten film studios receive 99 percent of all film revenue. The "
10315 "ten largest cable companies account for 85 percent of all cable "
10316 "revenue. This is a market far from the free press the framers sought to "
10317 "protect. Indeed, it is a market that is quite well protected— by the "
10321 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
10322 #: freeculture.xml:7823 freeculture.xml:7840
10323 msgid "Fallows, James"
10326 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10327 #: freeculture.xml:7820
10329 "Concentration in size alone is one thing. The more invidious change is in "
10330 "the nature of that concentration. As author James Fallows put it in a recent "
10331 "article about Rupert Murdoch, <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
10334 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
10335 #: freeculture.xml:7838
10337 "James Fallows, \"The Age of Murdoch,\" <citetitle>Atlantic "
10338 "Monthly</citetitle> (September 2003): 89. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
10342 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
10343 #: freeculture.xml:7827
10345 "Murdoch's companies now constitute a production system unmatched in its "
10346 "integration. They supply content—Fox movies . . . Fox TV shows "
10347 ". . . Fox-controlled sports broadcasts, plus newspapers and books. They sell "
10348 "the content to the public and to advertisers—in newspapers, on the "
10349 "broadcast network, on the cable channels. And they operate the physical "
10350 "distribution system through which the content reaches the "
10351 "customers. Murdoch's satellite systems now distribute News Corp. content in "
10352 "Europe and Asia; if Murdoch becomes DirecTV's largest single owner, that "
10353 "system will serve the same function in the United States.<placeholder "
10354 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
10357 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10358 #: freeculture.xml:7845
10360 "The pattern with Murdoch is the pattern of modern media. Not just large "
10361 "companies owning many radio stations, but a few companies owning as many "
10362 "outlets of media as possible. A picture describes this pattern better than a "
10363 "thousand words could do:"
10366 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure><title>
10367 #: freeculture.xml:7851
10368 msgid "Pattern of modern media ownership."
10371 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><figure>
10372 #: freeculture.xml:7852
10373 msgid "<graphic fileref=\"images/1761.png\"></graphic>"
10377 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10378 #: freeculture.xml:7856
10380 "Does this concentration matter? Will it affect what is made, or what is "
10381 "distributed? Or is it merely a more efficient way to produce and distribute "
10385 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10386 #: freeculture.xml:7861
10388 "My view was that concentration wouldn't matter. I thought it was nothing "
10389 "more than a more efficient financial structure. But now, after reading and "
10390 "listening to a barrage of creators try to convince me to the contrary, I am "
10391 "beginning to change my mind."
10394 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10395 #: freeculture.xml:7867
10397 "Here's a representative story that begins to suggest how this integration "
10401 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
10402 #: freeculture.xml:7870
10403 msgid "Lear, Norman"
10406 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
10407 #: freeculture.xml:7872 freeculture.xml:7936
10408 msgid "All in the Family"
10411 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10412 #: freeculture.xml:7874
10414 "In 1969, Norman Lear created a pilot for <citetitle>All in the "
10415 "Family</citetitle>. He took the pilot to ABC. The network didn't like it. It "
10416 "was too edgy, they told Lear. Make it again. Lear made a second pilot, more "
10417 "edgy than the first. ABC was exasperated. You're missing the point, they "
10418 "told Lear. We wanted less edgy, not more."
10422 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
10423 #: freeculture.xml:7886
10425 "Leonard Hill, \"The Axis of Access,\" remarks before Weidenbaum Center "
10426 "Forum, \"Entertainment Economics: The Movie Industry,\" St. Louis, Missouri, "
10427 "3 April 2003 (transcript of prepared remarks available at <ulink "
10428 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #28</ulink>; for the Lear story, "
10429 "not included in the prepared remarks, see <ulink "
10430 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #29</ulink>)."
10433 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10434 #: freeculture.xml:7881
10436 "Rather than comply, Lear simply took the show elsewhere. CBS was happy to "
10437 "have the series; ABC could not stop Lear from walking. The copyrights that "
10438 "Lear held assured an independence from network control.<placeholder "
10439 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
10443 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10444 #: freeculture.xml:7898
10446 "The network did not control those copyrights because the law forbade the "
10447 "networks from controlling the content they syndicated. The law required a "
10448 "separation between the networks and the content producers; that separation "
10449 "would guarantee Lear freedom. And as late as 1992, because of these rules, "
10450 "the vast majority of prime time television—75 percent of it—was "
10451 "\"independent\" of the networks."
10455 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
10456 #: freeculture.xml:7917
10458 "NewsCorp./DirecTV Merger and Media Consolidation: Hearings on Media "
10459 "Ownership Before the Senate Commerce Committee, 108th Cong., 1st "
10460 "sess. (2003) (testimony of Gene Kimmelman on behalf of Consumers Union and "
10461 "the Consumer Federation of America), available at <ulink "
10462 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #30</ulink>. Kimmelman quotes "
10463 "Victoria Riskin, president of Writers Guild of America, West, in her Remarks "
10464 "at FCC En Banc Hearing, Richmond, Virginia, 27 February 2003."
10467 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10468 #: freeculture.xml:7907
10470 "In 1994, the FCC abandoned the rules that required this independence. After "
10471 "that change, the networks quickly changed the balance. In 1985, there were "
10472 "twenty-five independent television production studios; in 2002, only five "
10473 "independent television studios remained. \"In 1992, only 15 percent of new "
10474 "series were produced for a network by a company it controlled. Last year, "
10475 "the percentage of shows produced by controlled companies more than "
10476 "quintupled to 77 percent.\" \"In 1992, 16 new series were produced "
10477 "independently of conglomerate control, last year there was "
10478 "one.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> In 2002, 75 percent of prime "
10479 "time television was owned by the networks that ran it. \"In the ten-year "
10480 "period between 1992 and 2002, the number of prime time television hours per "
10481 "week produced by network studios increased over 200%, whereas the number of "
10482 "prime time television hours per week produced by independent studios "
10483 "decreased 63%.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/>"
10486 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10487 #: freeculture.xml:7938
10489 "Today, another Norman Lear with another <citetitle>All in the "
10490 "Family</citetitle> would find that he had the choice either to make the show "
10491 "less edgy or to be fired: The content of any show developed for a network is "
10492 "increasingly owned by the network."
10495 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
10496 #: freeculture.xml:7947
10497 msgid "Diller, Barry"
10500 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
10501 #: freeculture.xml:7948
10502 msgid "Moyers, Bill"
10505 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10506 #: freeculture.xml:7944
10508 "While the number of channels has increased dramatically, the ownership of "
10509 "those channels has narrowed to an ever smaller and smaller few. As Barry "
10510 "Diller said to Bill Moyers, <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> "
10511 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
10515 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
10516 #: freeculture.xml:7961
10518 "\"Barry Diller Takes on Media Deregulation,\" <citetitle>Now with Bill "
10519 "Moyers</citetitle>, Bill Moyers, 25 April 2003, edited transcript available "
10520 "at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #31</ulink>."
10523 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
10524 #: freeculture.xml:7952
10526 "Well, if you have companies that produce, that finance, that air on their "
10527 "channel and then distribute worldwide everything that goes through their "
10528 "controlled distribution system, then what you get is fewer and fewer actual "
10529 "voices participating in the process. [We u]sed to have dozens and dozens of "
10530 "thriving independent production companies producing television programs. Now "
10531 "you have less than a handful.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
10534 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10535 #: freeculture.xml:7968
10537 "This narrowing has an effect on what is produced. The product of such large "
10538 "and concentrated networks is increasingly homogenous. Increasingly "
10539 "safe. Increasingly sterile. The product of news shows from networks like "
10540 "this is increasingly tailored to the message the network wants to "
10541 "convey. This is not the communist party, though from the inside, it must "
10542 "feel a bit like the communist party. No one can question without risk of "
10543 "consequence—not necessarily banishment to Siberia, but punishment "
10544 "nonetheless. Independent, critical, different views are quashed. This is not "
10545 "the environment for a democracy."
10548 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
10549 #: freeculture.xml:7979
10550 msgid "Clark, Kim B."
10554 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
10555 #: freeculture.xml:7988
10557 "Clayton M. Christensen, <citetitle>The Innovator's Dilemma: The "
10558 "Revolutionary National Bestseller that Changed the Way We Do "
10559 "Business</citetitle> (Cambridge: Harvard Business School Press, "
10560 "1997). Christensen acknowledges that the idea was first suggested by Dean "
10561 "Kim Clark. See Kim B. Clark, \"The Interaction of Design Hierarchies and "
10562 "Market Concepts in Technological Evolution,\" <citetitle>Research "
10563 "Policy</citetitle> 14 (1985): 235–51. For a more recent study, see "
10564 "Richard Foster and Sarah Kaplan, <citetitle>Creative Destruction: Why "
10565 "Companies That Are Built to Last Underperform the Market—and How to "
10566 "Successfully Transform Them</citetitle> (New York: Currency/Doubleday, "
10570 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10571 #: freeculture.xml:7981
10573 "Economics itself offers a parallel that explains why this integration "
10574 "affects creativity. Clay Christensen has written about the \"Innovator's "
10575 "Dilemma\": the fact that large traditional firms find it rational to ignore "
10576 "new, breakthrough technologies that compete with their core business. The "
10577 "same analysis could help explain why large, traditional media companies "
10578 "would find it rational to ignore new cultural trends.<placeholder "
10579 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Lumbering giants not only don't, but should "
10580 "not, sprint. Yet if the field is only open to the giants, there will be far "
10581 "too little sprinting. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
10584 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10585 #: freeculture.xml:8005
10587 "I don't think we know enough about the economics of the media market to say "
10588 "with certainty what concentration and integration will do. The efficiencies "
10589 "are important, and the effect on culture is hard to measure."
10592 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10593 #: freeculture.xml:8011
10595 "But there is a quintessentially obvious example that does strongly suggest "
10599 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10600 #: freeculture.xml:8015
10602 "In addition to the copyright wars, we're in the middle of the drug "
10603 "wars. Government policy is strongly directed against the drug cartels; "
10604 "criminal and civil courts are filled with the consequences of this battle."
10608 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10609 #: freeculture.xml:8020
10611 "Let me hereby disqualify myself from any possible appointment to any "
10612 "position in government by saying I believe this war is a profound mistake. I "
10613 "am not pro drugs. Indeed, I come from a family once wrecked by "
10614 "drugs—though the drugs that wrecked my family were all quite legal. I "
10615 "believe this war is a profound mistake because the collateral damage from it "
10616 "is so great as to make waging the war insane. When you add together the "
10617 "burdens on the criminal justice system, the desperation of generations of "
10618 "kids whose only real economic opportunities are as drug warriors, the "
10619 "queering of constitutional protections because of the constant surveillance "
10620 "this war requires, and, most profoundly, the total destruction of the legal "
10621 "systems of many South American nations because of the power of the local "
10622 "drug cartels, I find it impossible to believe that the marginal benefit in "
10623 "reduced drug consumption by Americans could possibly outweigh these costs."
10626 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10627 #: freeculture.xml:8039
10629 "You may not be convinced. That's fine. We live in a democracy, and it is "
10630 "through votes that we are to choose policy. But to do that, we depend "
10631 "fundamentally upon the press to help inform Americans about these issues."
10634 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10635 #: freeculture.xml:8045
10637 "Beginning in 1998, the Office of National Drug Control Policy launched a "
10638 "media campaign as part of the \"war on drugs.\" The campaign produced scores "
10639 "of short film clips about issues related to illegal drugs. In one series "
10640 "(the Nick and Norm series) two men are in a bar, discussing the idea of "
10641 "legalizing drugs as a way to avoid some of the collateral damage from the "
10642 "war. One advances an argument in favor of drug legalization. The other "
10643 "responds in a powerful and effective way against the argument of the "
10644 "first. In the end, the first guy changes his mind (hey, it's "
10645 "television). The plug at the end is a damning attack on the pro-legalization "
10649 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10650 #: freeculture.xml:8057
10652 "Fair enough. It's a good ad. Not terribly misleading. It delivers its "
10653 "message well. It's a fair and reasonable message."
10656 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10657 #: freeculture.xml:8061
10659 "But let's say you think it is a wrong message, and you'd like to run a "
10660 "countercommercial. Say you want to run a series of ads that try to "
10661 "demonstrate the extraordinary collateral harm that comes from the drug "
10662 "war. Can you do it?"
10666 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10667 #: freeculture.xml:8067
10669 "Well, obviously, these ads cost lots of money. Assume you raise the "
10670 "money. Assume a group of concerned citizens donates all the money in the "
10671 "world to help you get your message out. Can you be sure your message will be "
10675 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
10676 #: freeculture.xml:8108
10680 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
10681 #: freeculture.xml:8109
10682 msgid "Marijuana Policy Project"
10685 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
10686 #: freeculture.xml:8110
10690 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
10691 #: freeculture.xml:8084
10693 "The Marijuana Policy Project, in February 2003, sought to place ads that "
10694 "directly responded to the Nick and Norm series on stations within the "
10695 "Washington, D.C., area. Comcast rejected the ads as \"against [their] "
10696 "policy.\" The local NBC affiliate, WRC, rejected the ads without reviewing "
10697 "them. The local ABC affiliate, WJOA, originally agreed to run the ads and "
10698 "accepted payment to do so, but later decided not to run the ads and returned "
10699 "the collected fees. Interview with Neal Levine, 15 October 2003. These "
10700 "restrictions are, of course, not limited to drug policy. See, for example, "
10701 "Nat Ives, \"On the Issue of an Iraq War, Advocacy Ads Meet with Rejection "
10702 "from TV Networks,\" <citetitle>New York Times</citetitle>, 13 March 2003, "
10703 "C4. Outside of election-related air time there is very little that the FCC "
10704 "or the courts are willing to do to even the playing field. For a general "
10705 "overview, see Rhonda Brown, \"Ad Hoc Access: The Regulation of Editorial "
10706 "Advertising on Television and Radio,\" <citetitle>Yale Law and Policy "
10707 "Review</citetitle> 6 (1988): 449–79, and for a more recent summary of "
10708 "the stance of the FCC and the courts, see <citetitle>Radio-Television News "
10709 "Directors Association</citetitle> v. <citetitle>FCC</citetitle>, 184 F. 3d "
10710 "872 (D.C. Cir. 1999). Municipal authorities exercise the same authority as "
10711 "the networks. In a recent example from San Francisco, the San Francisco "
10712 "transit authority rejected an ad that criticized its Muni diesel "
10713 "buses. Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross, \"Antidiesel Group Fuming After Muni "
10714 "Rejects Ad,\" SFGate.com, 16 June 2003, available at <ulink "
10715 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #32</ulink>. The ground was that "
10716 "the criticism was \"too controversial.\" <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
10717 "id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/> <placeholder "
10718 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"2\"/>"
10721 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10722 #: freeculture.xml:8074
10724 "No. You cannot. Television stations have a general policy of avoiding "
10725 "\"controversial\" ads. Ads sponsored by the government are deemed "
10726 "uncontroversial; ads disagreeing with the government are controversial. "
10727 "This selectivity might be thought inconsistent with the First Amendment, but "
10728 "the Supreme Court has held that stations have the right to choose what they "
10729 "run. Thus, the major channels of commercial media will refuse one side of a "
10730 "crucial debate the opportunity to present its case. And the courts will "
10731 "defend the rights of the stations to be this biased.<placeholder "
10732 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
10735 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10736 #: freeculture.xml:8114
10738 "I'd be happy to defend the networks' rights, as well—if we lived in a "
10739 "media market that was truly diverse. But concentration in the media throws "
10740 "that condition into doubt. If a handful of companies control access to the "
10741 "media, and that handful of companies gets to decide which political "
10742 "positions it will allow to be promoted on its channels, then in an obvious "
10743 "and important way, concentration matters. You might like the positions the "
10744 "handful of companies selects. But you should not like a world in which a "
10745 "mere few get to decide which issues the rest of us get to know about."
10748 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
10749 #: freeculture.xml:8126
10753 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10754 #: freeculture.xml:8128
10756 "There is something innocent and obvious about the claim of the copyright "
10757 "warriors that the government should \"protect my property.\" In the "
10758 "abstract, it is obviously true and, ordinarily, totally harmless. No sane "
10759 "sort who is not an anarchist could disagree."
10763 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10764 #: freeculture.xml:8134
10766 "But when we see how dramatically this \"property\" has changed— when "
10767 "we recognize how it might now interact with both technology and markets to "
10768 "mean that the effective constraint on the liberty to cultivate our culture "
10769 "is dramatically different—the claim begins to seem less innocent and "
10770 "obvious. Given (1) the power of technology to supplement the law's control, "
10771 "and (2) the power of concentrated markets to weaken the opportunity for "
10772 "dissent, if strictly enforcing the massively expanded \"property\" rights "
10773 "granted by copyright fundamentally changes the freedom within this culture "
10774 "to cultivate and build upon our past, then we have to ask whether this "
10775 "property should be redefined."
10778 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10779 #: freeculture.xml:8150
10781 "Not starkly. Or absolutely. My point is not that we should abolish copyright "
10782 "or go back to the eighteenth century. That would be a total mistake, "
10783 "disastrous for the most important creative enterprises within our culture "
10787 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10788 #: freeculture.xml:8156
10790 "But there is a space between zero and one, Internet culture "
10791 "notwithstanding. And these massive shifts in the effective power of "
10792 "copyright regulation, tied to increased concentration of the content "
10793 "industry and resting in the hands of technology that will increasingly "
10794 "enable control over the use of culture, should drive us to consider whether "
10795 "another adjustment is called for. Not an adjustment that increases "
10796 "copyright's power. Not an adjustment that increases its term. Rather, an "
10797 "adjustment to restore the balance that has traditionally defined copyright's "
10798 "regulation—a weakening of that regulation, to strengthen creativity."
10801 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10802 #: freeculture.xml:8168
10804 "Copyright law has not been a rock of Gibraltar. It's not a set of constant "
10805 "commitments that, for some mysterious reason, teenagers and geeks now "
10806 "flout. Instead, copyright power has grown dramatically in a short period of "
10807 "time, as the technologies of distribution and creation have changed and as "
10808 "lobbyists have pushed for more control by copyright holders. Changes in the "
10809 "past in response to changes in technology suggest that we may well need "
10810 "similar changes in the future. And these changes have to be "
10811 "<emphasis>reductions</emphasis> in the scope of copyright, in response to "
10812 "the extraordinary increase in control that technology and the market enable."
10816 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10817 #: freeculture.xml:8180
10819 "For the single point that is lost in this war on pirates is a point that we "
10820 "see only after surveying the range of these changes. When you add together "
10821 "the effect of changing law, concentrated markets, and changing technology, "
10822 "together they produce an astonishing conclusion: <emphasis>Never in our "
10823 "history have fewer had a legal right to control more of the development of "
10824 "our culture than now</emphasis>."
10827 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
10828 #: freeculture.xml:8204
10830 "Siva Vaidhyanathan captures a similar point in his \"four surrenders\" of "
10831 "copyright law in the digital age. See Vaidhyanathan, 159–60. "
10832 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
10835 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10836 #: freeculture.xml:8189
10838 "Not when copyrights were perpetual, for when copyrights were perpetual, they "
10839 "affected only that precise creative work. Not when only publishers had the "
10840 "tools to publish, for the market then was much more diverse. Not when there "
10841 "were only three television networks, for even then, newspapers, film "
10842 "studios, radio stations, and publishers were independent of the "
10843 "networks. <emphasis>Never</emphasis> has copyright protected such a wide "
10844 "range of rights, against as broad a range of actors, for a term that was "
10845 "remotely as long. This form of regulation—a tiny regulation of a tiny "
10846 "part of the creative energy of a nation at the founding—is now a "
10847 "massive regulation of the overall creative process. Law plus technology plus "
10848 "the market now interact to turn this historically benign regulation into the "
10849 "most significant regulation of culture that our free society has "
10850 "known.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
10853 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10854 #: freeculture.xml:8210
10855 msgid "This has been a long chapter. Its point can now be briefly stated."
10858 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10859 #: freeculture.xml:8213
10861 "At the start of this book, I distinguished between commercial and "
10862 "noncommercial culture. In the course of this chapter, I have distinguished "
10863 "between copying a work and transforming it. We can now combine these two "
10864 "distinctions and draw a clear map of the changes that copyright law has "
10865 "undergone. In 1790, the law looked like this:"
10868 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><thead><row><entry>
10869 #: freeculture.xml:8226 freeculture.xml:8264
10873 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><thead><row><entry>
10874 #: freeculture.xml:8227 freeculture.xml:8265 freeculture.xml:8304 freeculture.xml:8337
10878 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
10879 #: freeculture.xml:8232 freeculture.xml:8270 freeculture.xml:8309 freeculture.xml:8342
10883 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
10884 #: freeculture.xml:8233 freeculture.xml:8271 freeculture.xml:8272 freeculture.xml:8310 freeculture.xml:8311 freeculture.xml:8343 freeculture.xml:8344 freeculture.xml:8348 freeculture.xml:8349
10888 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
10889 #: freeculture.xml:8234 freeculture.xml:8238 freeculture.xml:8239 freeculture.xml:8276 freeculture.xml:8277 freeculture.xml:8316
10893 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
10894 #: freeculture.xml:8237 freeculture.xml:8275 freeculture.xml:8314 freeculture.xml:8347
10895 msgid "Noncommercial"
10899 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10900 #: freeculture.xml:8246
10902 "The act of publishing a map, chart, and book was regulated by copyright "
10903 "law. Nothing else was. Transformations were free. And as copyright attached "
10904 "only with registration, and only those who intended to benefit commercially "
10905 "would register, copying through publishing of noncommercial work was also "
10909 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10910 #: freeculture.xml:8255
10911 msgid "By the end of the nineteenth century, the law had changed to this:"
10914 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10915 #: freeculture.xml:8284
10917 "Derivative works were now regulated by copyright law—if published, "
10918 "which again, given the economics of publishing at the time, means if offered "
10919 "commercially. But noncommercial publishing and transformation were still "
10920 "essentially free."
10923 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10924 #: freeculture.xml:8290
10926 "In 1909 the law changed to regulate copies, not publishing, and after this "
10927 "change, the scope of the law was tied to technology. As the technology of "
10928 "copying became more prevalent, the reach of the law expanded. Thus by 1975, "
10929 "as photocopying machines became more common, we could say the law began to "
10933 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><thead><row><entry>
10934 #: freeculture.xml:8303 freeculture.xml:8336
10938 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><table><tgroup><tbody><row><entry>
10939 #: freeculture.xml:8315
10940 msgid "©/Free"
10943 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10944 #: freeculture.xml:8323
10946 "The law was interpreted to reach noncommercial copying through, say, copy "
10947 "machines, but still much of copying outside of the commercial market "
10948 "remained free. But the consequence of the emergence of digital technologies, "
10949 "especially in the context of a digital network, means that the law now looks "
10954 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10955 #: freeculture.xml:8356
10957 "Every realm is governed by copyright law, whereas before most creativity was "
10958 "not. The law now regulates the full range of creativity— commercial or "
10959 "not, transformative or not—with the same rules designed to regulate "
10960 "commercial publishers."
10963 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10964 #: freeculture.xml:8364
10966 "Obviously, copyright law is not the enemy. The enemy is regulation that does "
10967 "no good. So the question that we should be asking just now is whether "
10968 "extending the regulations of copyright law into each of these domains "
10969 "actually does any good."
10972 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10973 #: freeculture.xml:8370
10975 "I have no doubt that it does good in regulating commercial copying. But I "
10976 "also have no doubt that it does more harm than good when regulating (as it "
10977 "regulates just now) noncommercial copying and, especially, noncommercial "
10978 "transformation. And increasingly, for the reasons sketched especially in "
10979 "chapters 7 and 8, one might well wonder whether it does more harm than good "
10980 "for commercial transformation. More commercial transformative work would be "
10981 "created if derivative rights were more sharply restricted."
10985 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
10986 #: freeculture.xml:8386
10988 "It was the single most important contribution of the legal realist movement "
10989 "to demonstrate that all property rights are always crafted to balance public "
10990 "and private interests. See Thomas C. Grey, \"The Disintegration of "
10991 "Property,\" in <citetitle>Nomos XXII: Property</citetitle>, J. Roland "
10992 "Pennock and John W. Chapman, eds. (New York: New York University Press, "
10996 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
10997 #: freeculture.xml:8380
10999 "The issue is therefore not simply whether copyright is property. Of course "
11000 "copyright is a kind of \"property,\" and of course, as with any property, "
11001 "the state ought to protect it. But first impressions notwithstanding, "
11002 "historically, this property right (as with all property rights<placeholder "
11003 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>) has been crafted to balance the important "
11004 "need to give authors and artists incentives with the equally important need "
11005 "to assure access to creative work. This balance has always been struck in "
11006 "light of new technologies. And for almost half of our tradition, the "
11007 "\"copyright\" did not control <emphasis>at all</emphasis> the freedom of "
11008 "others to build upon or transform a creative work. American culture was born "
11009 "free, and for almost 180 years our country consistently protected a vibrant "
11010 "and rich free culture."
11014 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11015 #: freeculture.xml:8403
11017 "We achieved that free culture because our law respected important limits on "
11018 "the scope of the interests protected by \"property.\" The very birth of "
11019 "\"copyright\" as a statutory right recognized those limits, by granting "
11020 "copyright owners protection for a limited time only (the story of chapter "
11021 "6). The tradition of \"fair use\" is animated by a similar concern that is "
11022 "increasingly under strain as the costs of exercising any fair use right "
11023 "become unavoidably high (the story of chapter 7). Adding statutory rights "
11024 "where markets might stifle innovation is another familiar limit on the "
11025 "property right that copyright is (chapter 8). And granting archives and "
11026 "libraries a broad freedom to collect, claims of property notwithstanding, is "
11027 "a crucial part of guaranteeing the soul of a culture (chapter 9). Free "
11028 "cultures, like free markets, are built with property. But the nature of the "
11029 "property that builds a free culture is very different from the extremist "
11030 "vision that dominates the debate today."
11033 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11034 #: freeculture.xml:8422
11036 "Free culture is increasingly the casualty in this war on piracy. In response "
11037 "to a real, if not yet quantified, threat that the technologies of the "
11038 "Internet present to twentieth-century business models for producing and "
11039 "distributing culture, the law and technology are being transformed in a way "
11040 "that will undermine our tradition of free culture. The property right that "
11041 "is copyright is no longer the balanced right that it was, or was intended to "
11042 "be. The property right that is copyright has become unbalanced, tilted "
11043 "toward an extreme. The opportunity to create and transform becomes weakened "
11044 "in a world in which creation requires permission and creativity must check "
11048 #. type: Content of: <book><part><title>
11049 #: freeculture.xml:8439
11053 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
11054 #: freeculture.xml:8443
11055 msgid "CHAPTER ELEVEN: Chimera"
11058 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
11059 #: freeculture.xml:8445
11063 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
11064 #: freeculture.xml:8448
11065 msgid "Wells, H. G."
11068 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
11069 #: freeculture.xml:8451
11070 msgid ""Country of the Blind, The" (Wells)"
11074 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
11075 #: freeculture.xml:8459
11077 "H. G. Wells, \"The Country of the Blind\" (1904, 1911). See H. G. Wells, "
11078 "<citetitle>The Country of the Blind and Other Stories</citetitle>, Michael "
11079 "Sherborne, ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996)."
11082 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11083 #: freeculture.xml:8455
11085 "In a well-known short story by H. G. Wells, a mountain climber named Nunez "
11086 "trips (literally, down an ice slope) into an unknown and isolated valley in "
11087 "the Peruvian Andes.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The valley is "
11088 "extraordinarily beautiful, with \"sweet water, pasture, an even climate, "
11089 "slopes of rich brown soil with tangles of a shrub that bore an excellent "
11090 "fruit.\" But the villagers are all blind. Nunez takes this as an "
11091 "opportunity. \"In the Country of the Blind,\" he tells himself, \"the "
11092 "One-Eyed Man is King.\" So he resolves to live with the villagers to explore "
11096 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11097 #: freeculture.xml:8471
11099 "Things don't go quite as he planned. He tries to explain the idea of sight "
11100 "to the villagers. They don't understand. He tells them they are \"blind.\" "
11101 "They don't have the word <citetitle>blind</citetitle>. They think he's just "
11102 "thick. Indeed, as they increasingly notice the things he can't do (hear the "
11103 "sound of grass being stepped on, for example), they increasingly try to "
11104 "control him. He, in turn, becomes increasingly frustrated. \"`You don't "
11105 "understand,' he cried, in a voice that was meant to be great and resolute, "
11106 "and which broke. `You are blind and I can see. Leave me alone!'\""
11110 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11111 #: freeculture.xml:8483
11113 "The villagers don't leave him alone. Nor do they see (so to speak) the "
11114 "virtue of his special power. Not even the ultimate target of his affection, "
11115 "a young woman who to him seems \"the most beautiful thing in the whole of "
11116 "creation,\" understands the beauty of sight. Nunez's description of what he "
11117 "sees \"seemed to her the most poetical of fancies, and she listened to his "
11118 "description of the stars and the mountains and her own sweet white-lit "
11119 "beauty as though it was a guilty indulgence.\" \"She did not believe,\" "
11120 "Wells tells us, and \"she could only half understand, but she was "
11121 "mysteriously delighted.\""
11124 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11125 #: freeculture.xml:8494
11127 "When Nunez announces his desire to marry his \"mysteriously delighted\" "
11128 "love, the father and the village object. \"You see, my dear,\" her father "
11129 "instructs, \"he's an idiot. He has delusions. He can't do anything right.\" "
11130 "They take Nunez to the village doctor."
11133 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11134 #: freeculture.xml:8500
11136 "After a careful examination, the doctor gives his opinion. \"His brain is "
11137 "affected,\" he reports."
11140 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11141 #: freeculture.xml:8504
11143 "\"What affects it?\" the father asks. \"Those queer things that are called "
11144 "the eyes . . . are diseased . . . in such a way as to affect his brain.\""
11147 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11148 #: freeculture.xml:8509
11150 "The doctor continues: \"I think I may say with reasonable certainty that in "
11151 "order to cure him completely, all that we need to do is a simple and easy "
11152 "surgical operation—namely, to remove these irritant bodies [the "
11157 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11158 #: freeculture.xml:8515
11160 "\"Thank Heaven for science!\" says the father to the doctor. They inform "
11161 "Nunez of this condition necessary for him to be allowed his bride. (You'll "
11162 "have to read the original to learn what happens in the end. I believe in "
11163 "free culture, but never in giving away the end of a story.) It sometimes "
11164 "happens that the eggs of twins fuse in the mother's womb. That fusion "
11165 "produces a \"chimera.\" A chimera is a single creature with two sets of "
11166 "DNA. The DNA in the blood, for example, might be different from the DNA of "
11167 "the skin. This possibility is an underused plot for murder mysteries. \"But "
11168 "the DNA shows with 100 percent certainty that she was not the person whose "
11169 "blood was at the scene. . . .\""
11172 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11173 #: freeculture.xml:8532
11175 "Before I had read about chimeras, I would have said they were impossible. A "
11176 "single person can't have two sets of DNA. The very idea of DNA is that it is "
11177 "the code of an individual. Yet in fact, not only can two individuals have "
11178 "the same set of DNA (identical twins), but one person can have two different "
11179 "sets of DNA (a chimera). Our understanding of a \"person\" should reflect "
11183 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11184 #: freeculture.xml:8540
11186 "The more I work to understand the current struggle over copyright and "
11187 "culture, which I've sometimes called unfairly, and sometimes not unfairly "
11188 "enough, \"the copyright wars,\" the more I think we're dealing with a "
11189 "chimera. For example, in the battle over the question \"What is p2p file "
11190 "sharing?\" both sides have it right, and both sides have it wrong. One side "
11191 "says, \"File sharing is just like two kids taping each others' "
11192 "records—the sort of thing we've been doing for the last thirty years "
11193 "without any question at all.\" That's true, at least in part. When I tell my "
11194 "best friend to try out a new CD that I've bought, but rather than just send "
11195 "the CD, I point him to my p2p server, that is, in all relevant respects, "
11196 "just like what every executive in every recording company no doubt did as a "
11197 "kid: sharing music."
11200 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11201 #: freeculture.xml:8554
11203 "But the description is also false in part. For when my p2p server is on a "
11204 "p2p network through which anyone can get access to my music, then sure, my "
11205 "friends can get access, but it stretches the meaning of \"friends\" beyond "
11206 "recognition to say \"my ten thousand best friends\" can get access. Whether "
11207 "or not sharing my music with my best friend is what \"we have always been "
11208 "allowed to do,\" we have not always been allowed to share music with \"our "
11209 "ten thousand best friends.\""
11212 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11213 #: freeculture.xml:8563
11215 "Likewise, when the other side says, \"File sharing is just like walking into "
11216 "a Tower Records and taking a CD off the shelf and walking out with it,\" "
11217 "that's true, at least in part. If, after Lyle Lovett (finally) releases a "
11218 "new album, rather than buying it, I go to Kazaa and find a free copy to "
11219 "take, that is very much like stealing a copy from Tower. <placeholder "
11220 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
11224 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11225 #: freeculture.xml:8574
11227 "But it is not quite stealing from Tower. After all, when I take a CD from "
11228 "Tower Records, Tower has one less CD to sell. And when I take a CD from "
11229 "Tower Records, I get a bit of plastic and a cover, and something to show on "
11230 "my shelves. (And, while we're at it, we could also note that when I take a "
11231 "CD from Tower Records, the maximum fine that might be imposed on me, under "
11232 "California law, at least, is $1,000. According to the RIAA, by contrast, if "
11233 "I download a ten-song CD, I'm liable for $1,500,000 in damages.)"
11236 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11237 #: freeculture.xml:8584
11239 "The point is not that it is as neither side describes. The point is that it "
11240 "is both—both as the RIAA describes it and as Kazaa describes it. It is "
11241 "a chimera. And rather than simply denying what the other side asserts, we "
11242 "need to begin to think about how we should respond to this chimera. What "
11243 "rules should govern it?"
11246 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
11247 #: freeculture.xml:8630 freeculture.xml:9331
11248 msgid "Berman, Howard L."
11251 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
11252 #: freeculture.xml:8600
11254 "For an excellent summary, see the report prepared by GartnerG2 and the "
11255 "Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, \"Copyright "
11256 "and Digital Media in a Post-Napster World,\" 27 June 2003, available at "
11257 "<ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #33</ulink>. Reps. John "
11258 "Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) and Howard L. Berman (D-Calif.) have introduced a bill "
11259 "that would treat unauthorized on-line copying as a felony offense with "
11260 "punishments ranging as high as five years imprisonment; see Jon Healey, "
11261 "\"House Bill Aims to Up Stakes on Piracy,\" <citetitle>Los Angeles "
11262 "Times</citetitle>, 17 July 2003, available at <ulink "
11263 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #34</ulink>. Civil penalties are "
11264 "currently set at $150,000 per copied song. For a recent (and unsuccessful) "
11265 "legal challenge to the RIAA's demand that an ISP reveal the identity of a "
11266 "user accused of sharing more than 600 songs through a family computer, see "
11267 "<citetitle>RIAA</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Verizon Internet Services (In "
11268 "re. Verizon Internet Services)</citetitle>, 240 F. Supp. 2d 24 "
11269 "(D.D.C. 2003). Such a user could face liability ranging as high as $90 "
11270 "million. Such astronomical figures furnish the RIAA with a powerful arsenal "
11271 "in its prosecution of file sharers. Settlements ranging from $12,000 to "
11272 "$17,500 for four students accused of heavy file sharing on university "
11273 "networks must have seemed a mere pittance next to the $98 billion the RIAA "
11274 "could seek should the matter proceed to court. See Elizabeth Young, "
11275 "\"Downloading Could Lead to Fines,\" redandblack.com, August 2003, available "
11276 "at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #35</ulink>. For an "
11277 "example of the RIAA's targeting of student file sharing, and of the "
11278 "subpoenas issued to universities to reveal student file-sharer identities, "
11279 "see James Collins, \"RIAA Steps Up Bid to Force BC, MIT to Name Students,\" "
11280 "<citetitle>Boston Globe</citetitle>, 8 August 2003, D3, available at <ulink "
11281 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #36</ulink>. <placeholder "
11282 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
11285 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11286 #: freeculture.xml:8591
11288 "We could respond by simply pretending that it is not a chimera. We could, "
11289 "with the RIAA, decide that every act of file sharing should be a felony. We "
11290 "could prosecute families for millions of dollars in damages just because "
11291 "file sharing occurred on a family computer. And we can get universities to "
11292 "monitor all computer traffic to make sure that no computer is used to commit "
11293 "this crime. These responses might be extreme, but each of them has either "
11294 "been proposed or actually implemented.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
11298 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11299 #: freeculture.xml:8636
11301 "Alternatively, we could respond to file sharing the way many kids act as "
11302 "though we've responded. We could totally legalize it. Let there be no "
11303 "copyright liability, either civil or criminal, for making copyrighted "
11304 "content available on the Net. Make file sharing like gossip: regulated, if "
11305 "at all, by social norms but not by law."
11308 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11309 #: freeculture.xml:8643
11311 "Either response is possible. I think either would be a mistake. Rather than "
11312 "embrace one of these two extremes, we should embrace something that "
11313 "recognizes the truth in both. And while I end this book with a sketch of a "
11314 "system that does just that, my aim in the next chapter is to show just how "
11315 "awful it would be for us to adopt the zero-tolerance extreme. I believe "
11316 "<emphasis>either</emphasis> extreme would be worse than a reasonable "
11317 "alternative. But I believe the zero-tolerance solution would be the worse "
11318 "of the two extremes."
11322 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11323 #: freeculture.xml:8655
11325 "Yet zero tolerance is increasingly our government's policy. In the middle of "
11326 "the chaos that the Internet has created, an extraordinary land grab is "
11327 "occurring. The law and technology are being shifted to give content holders "
11328 "a kind of control over our culture that they have never had before. And in "
11329 "this extremism, many an opportunity for new innovation and new creativity "
11333 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11334 #: freeculture.xml:8663
11336 "I'm not talking about the opportunities for kids to \"steal\" music. My "
11337 "focus instead is the commercial and cultural innovation that this war will "
11338 "also kill. We have never seen the power to innovate spread so broadly among "
11339 "our citizens, and we have just begun to see the innovation that this power "
11340 "will unleash. Yet the Internet has already seen the passing of one cycle of "
11341 "innovation around technologies to distribute content. The law is responsible "
11342 "for this passing. As the vice president for global public policy at one of "
11343 "these new innovators, eMusic.com, put it when criticizing the DMCA's added "
11344 "protection for copyrighted material,"
11347 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
11348 #: freeculture.xml:8676
11350 "eMusic opposes music piracy. We are a distributor of copyrighted material, "
11351 "and we want to protect those rights."
11354 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
11355 #: freeculture.xml:8680
11357 "But building a technology fortress that locks in the clout of the major "
11358 "labels is by no means the only way to protect copyright interests, nor is it "
11359 "necessarily the best. It is simply too early to answer that question. Market "
11360 "forces operating naturally may very well produce a totally different "
11365 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
11366 #: freeculture.xml:8698
11368 "WIPO and the DMCA One Year Later: Assessing Consumer Access to Digital "
11369 "Entertainment on the Internet and Other Media: Hearing Before the "
11370 "Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade, and Consumer Protection, House "
11371 "Committee on Commerce, 106th Cong. 29 (1999) (statement of Peter Harter, "
11372 "vice president, Global Public Policy and Standards, EMusic.com), available "
11373 "in LEXIS, Federal Document Clearing House Congressional Testimony File."
11376 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
11377 #: freeculture.xml:8688
11379 "This is a critical point. The choices that industry sectors make with "
11380 "respect to these systems will in many ways directly shape the market for "
11381 "digital media and the manner in which digital media are distributed. This in "
11382 "turn will directly influence the options that are available to consumers, "
11383 "both in terms of the ease with which they will be able to access digital "
11384 "media and the equipment that they will require to do so. Poor choices made "
11385 "this early in the game will retard the growth of this market, hurting "
11386 "everyone's interests.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
11389 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
11390 #: freeculture.xml:8712 freeculture.xml:9061
11391 msgid "Vivendi Universal"
11394 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11395 #: freeculture.xml:8709
11397 "In April 2001, eMusic.com was purchased by Vivendi Universal, one of \"the "
11398 "major labels.\" Its position on these matters has now changed. <placeholder "
11399 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
11402 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11403 #: freeculture.xml:8715
11405 "Reversing our tradition of tolerance now will not merely quash piracy. It "
11406 "will sacrifice values that are important to this culture, and will kill "
11407 "opportunities that could be extraordinarily valuable."
11410 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
11411 #: freeculture.xml:8723
11412 msgid "CHAPTER TWELVE: Harms"
11415 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11416 #: freeculture.xml:8726
11418 "To fight \"piracy,\" to protect \"property,\" the content industry has "
11419 "launched a war. Lobbying and lots of campaign contributions have now brought "
11420 "the government into this war. As with any war, this one will have both "
11421 "direct and collateral damage. As with any war of prohibition, these damages "
11422 "will be suffered most by our own people."
11425 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11426 #: freeculture.xml:8734
11428 "My aim so far has been to describe the consequences of this war, in "
11429 "particular, the consequences for \"free culture.\" But my aim now is to "
11430 "extend this description of consequences into an argument. Is this war "
11434 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11435 #: freeculture.xml:8741
11437 "In my view, it is not. There is no good reason why this time, for the first "
11438 "time, the law should defend the old against the new, just when the power of "
11439 "the property called \"intellectual property\" is at its greatest in our "
11443 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11444 #: freeculture.xml:8749
11446 "Yet \"common sense\" does not see it this way. Common sense is still on the "
11447 "side of the Causbys and the content industry. The extreme claims of control "
11448 "in the name of property still resonate; the uncritical rejection of "
11449 "\"piracy\" still has play."
11453 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
11454 #: freeculture.xml:8756
11456 "There will be many consequences of continuing this war. I want to describe "
11457 "just three. All three might be said to be unintended. I am quite confident "
11458 "the third is unintended. I'm less sure about the first two. The first two "
11459 "protect modern RCAs, but there is no Howard Armstrong in the wings to fight "
11460 "today's monopolists of culture."
11463 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
11464 #: freeculture.xml:8763
11465 msgid "Constraining Creators"
11468 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11469 #: freeculture.xml:8765
11471 "In the next ten years we will see an explosion of digital technologies. "
11472 "These technologies will enable almost anyone to capture and share "
11473 "content. Capturing and sharing content, of course, is what humans have done "
11474 "since the dawn of man. It is how we learn and communicate. But capturing and "
11475 "sharing through digital technology is different. The fidelity and power are "
11476 "different. You could send an e-mail telling someone about a joke you saw on "
11477 "Comedy Central, or you could send the clip. You could write an essay about "
11478 "the inconsistencies in the arguments of the politician you most love to "
11479 "hate, or you could make a short film that puts statement against "
11480 "statement. You could write a poem to express your love, or you could weave "
11481 "together a string—a mash-up— of songs from your favorite artists "
11482 "in a collage and make it available on the Net."
11485 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11486 #: freeculture.xml:8780
11488 "This digital \"capturing and sharing\" is in part an extension of the "
11489 "capturing and sharing that has always been integral to our culture, and in "
11490 "part it is something new. It is continuous with the Kodak, but it explodes "
11491 "the boundaries of Kodak-like technologies. The technology of digital "
11492 "\"capturing and sharing\" promises a world of extraordinarily diverse "
11493 "creativity that can be easily and broadly shared. And as that creativity is "
11494 "applied to democracy, it will enable a broad range of citizens to use "
11495 "technology to express and criticize and contribute to the culture all "
11500 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11501 #: freeculture.xml:8791
11503 "Technology has thus given us an opportunity to do something with culture "
11504 "that has only ever been possible for individuals in small groups, isolated "
11505 "from others. Think about an old man telling a story to a collection of "
11506 "neighbors in a small town. Now imagine that same storytelling extended "
11507 "across the globe."
11510 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11511 #: freeculture.xml:8801
11513 "Yet all this is possible only if the activity is presumptively legal. In the "
11514 "current regime of legal regulation, it is not. Forget file sharing for a "
11515 "moment. Think about your favorite amazing sites on the Net. Web sites that "
11516 "offer plot summaries from forgotten television shows; sites that catalog "
11517 "cartoons from the 1960s; sites that mix images and sound to criticize "
11518 "politicians or businesses; sites that gather newspaper articles on remote "
11519 "topics of science or culture. There is a vast amount of creative work spread "
11520 "across the Internet. But as the law is currently crafted, this work is "
11521 "presumptively illegal."
11524 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
11525 #: freeculture.xml:8829 freeculture.xml:8850
11529 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
11530 #: freeculture.xml:8824
11532 "See Lynne W. Jeter, <citetitle>Disconnected: Deceit and Betrayal at "
11533 "WorldCom</citetitle> (Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley & Sons, 2003), 176, 204; "
11534 "for details of the settlement, see MCI press release, \"MCI Wins "
11535 "U.S. District Court Approval for SEC Settlement\" (7 July 2003), available "
11536 "at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #37</ulink>. "
11537 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
11540 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
11541 #: freeculture.xml:8845
11542 msgid "Bush, George W."
11545 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
11546 #: freeculture.xml:8836
11548 "The bill, modeled after California's tort reform model, was passed in the "
11549 "House of Representatives but defeated in a Senate vote in July 2003. For an "
11550 "overview, see Tanya Albert, \"Measure Stalls in Senate: `We'll Be Back,' Say "
11551 "Tort Reformers,\" amednews.com, 28 July 2003, available at <ulink "
11552 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #38</ulink>, and \"Senate Turns "
11553 "Back Malpractice Caps,\" CBSNews.com, 9 July 2003, available at <ulink "
11554 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #39</ulink>. President Bush has "
11555 "continued to urge tort reform in recent months. <placeholder "
11556 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
11559 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11560 #: freeculture.xml:8812
11562 "That presumption will increasingly chill creativity, as the examples of "
11563 "extreme penalties for vague infringements continue to proliferate. It is "
11564 "impossible to get a clear sense of what's allowed and what's not, and at the "
11565 "same time, the penalties for crossing the line are astonishingly harsh. The "
11566 "four students who were threatened by the RIAA ( Jesse Jordan of chapter 3 "
11567 "was just one) were threatened with a $98 billion lawsuit for building search "
11568 "engines that permitted songs to be copied. Yet World-Com—which "
11569 "defrauded investors of $11 billion, resulting in a loss to investors in "
11570 "market capitalization of over $200 billion—received a fine of a mere "
11571 "$750 million.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> And under legislation "
11572 "being pushed in Congress right now, a doctor who negligently removes the "
11573 "wrong leg in an operation would be liable for no more than $250,000 in "
11574 "damages for pain and suffering.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> Can "
11575 "common sense recognize the absurdity in a world where the maximum fine for "
11576 "downloading two songs off the Internet is more than the fine for a doctor's "
11577 "negligently butchering a patient? <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"2\"/>"
11581 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
11582 #: freeculture.xml:8872
11584 "See Danit Lidor, \"Artists Just Wanna Be Free,\" "
11585 "<citetitle>Wired</citetitle>, 7 July 2003, available at <ulink "
11586 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #40</ulink>. For an overview of "
11587 "the exhibition, see <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
11591 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11592 #: freeculture.xml:8853
11594 "The consequence of this legal uncertainty, tied to these extremely high "
11595 "penalties, is that an extraordinary amount of creativity will either never "
11596 "be exercised, or never be exercised in the open. We drive this creative "
11597 "process underground by branding the modern-day Walt Disneys \"pirates.\" We "
11598 "make it impossible for businesses to rely upon a public domain, because the "
11599 "boundaries of the public domain are designed to be unclear. It never pays to "
11600 "do anything except pay for the right to create, and hence only those who can "
11601 "pay are allowed to create. As was the case in the Soviet Union, though for "
11602 "very different reasons, we will begin to see a world of underground "
11603 "art—not because the message is necessarily political, or because the "
11604 "subject is controversial, but because the very act of creating the art is "
11605 "legally fraught. Already, exhibits of \"illegal art\" tour the United "
11606 "States.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> In what does their "
11607 "\"illegality\" consist? In the act of mixing the culture around us with an "
11608 "expression that is critical or reflective."
11611 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11612 #: freeculture.xml:8882
11614 "Part of the reason for this fear of illegality has to do with the changing "
11615 "law. I described that change in detail in chapter 10. But an even bigger "
11616 "part has to do with the increasing ease with which infractions can be "
11617 "tracked. As users of file-sharing systems discovered in 2002, it is a "
11618 "trivial matter for copyright owners to get courts to order Internet service "
11619 "providers to reveal who has what content. It is as if your cassette tape "
11620 "player transmitted a list of the songs that you played in the privacy of "
11621 "your own home that anyone could tune into for whatever reason they chose."
11624 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11625 #: freeculture.xml:8893
11627 "Never in our history has a painter had to worry about whether his painting "
11628 "infringed on someone else's work; but the modern-day painter, using the "
11629 "tools of Photoshop, sharing content on the Web, must worry all the "
11630 "time. Images are all around, but the only safe images to use in the act of "
11631 "creation are those purchased from Corbis or another image farm. And in "
11632 "purchasing, censoring happens. There is a free market in pencils; we needn't "
11633 "worry about its effect on creativity. But there is a highly regulated, "
11634 "monopolized market in cultural icons; the right to cultivate and transform "
11635 "them is not similarly free."
11638 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11639 #: freeculture.xml:8904
11641 "Lawyers rarely see this because lawyers are rarely empirical. As I described "
11642 "in chapter 7, in response to the story about documentary filmmaker Jon Else, "
11643 "I have been lectured again and again by lawyers who insist Else's use was "
11644 "fair use, and hence I am wrong to say that the law regulates such a use."
11648 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11649 #: freeculture.xml:8913
11651 "But fair use in America simply means the right to hire a lawyer to defend "
11652 "your right to create. And as lawyers love to forget, our system for "
11653 "defending rights such as fair use is astonishingly bad—in practically "
11654 "every context, but especially here. It costs too much, it delivers too "
11655 "slowly, and what it delivers often has little connection to the justice "
11656 "underlying the claim. The legal system may be tolerable for the very rich. "
11657 "For everyone else, it is an embarrassment to a tradition that prides itself "
11658 "on the rule of law."
11661 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11662 #: freeculture.xml:8923
11664 "Judges and lawyers can tell themselves that fair use provides adequate "
11665 "\"breathing room\" between regulation by the law and the access the law "
11666 "should allow. But it is a measure of how out of touch our legal system has "
11667 "become that anyone actually believes this. The rules that publishers impose "
11668 "upon writers, the rules that film distributors impose upon filmmakers, the "
11669 "rules that newspapers impose upon journalists— these are the real laws "
11670 "governing creativity. And these rules have little relationship to the "
11671 "\"law\" with which judges comfort themselves."
11674 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11675 #: freeculture.xml:8934
11677 "For in a world that threatens $150,000 for a single willful infringement of "
11678 "a copyright, and which demands tens of thousands of dollars to even defend "
11679 "against a copyright infringement claim, and which would never return to the "
11680 "wrongfully accused defendant anything of the costs she suffered to defend "
11681 "her right to speak—in that world, the astonishingly broad regulations "
11682 "that pass under the name \"copyright\" silence speech and creativity. And in "
11683 "that world, it takes a studied blindness for people to continue to believe "
11684 "they live in a culture that is free."
11687 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11688 #: freeculture.xml:8945
11689 msgid "As Jed Horovitz, the businessman behind Video Pipeline, said to me,"
11693 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
11694 #: freeculture.xml:8949
11696 "We're losing [creative] opportunities right and left. Creative people are "
11697 "being forced not to express themselves. Thoughts are not being "
11698 "expressed. And while a lot of stuff may [still] be created, it still won't "
11699 "get distributed. Even if the stuff gets made . . . you're not going to get "
11700 "it distributed in the mainstream media unless you've got a little note from "
11701 "a lawyer saying, \"This has been cleared.\" You're not even going to get it "
11702 "on PBS without that kind of permission. That's the point at which they "
11706 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
11707 #: freeculture.xml:8962
11708 msgid "Constraining Innovators"
11711 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11712 #: freeculture.xml:8964
11714 "The story of the last section was a crunchy-lefty story—creativity "
11715 "quashed, artists who can't speak, yada yada yada. Maybe that doesn't get you "
11716 "going. Maybe you think there's enough weird art out there, and enough "
11717 "expression that is critical of what seems to be just about everything. And "
11718 "if you think that, you might think there's little in this story to worry "
11722 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11723 #: freeculture.xml:8972
11725 "But there's an aspect of this story that is not lefty in any sense. Indeed, "
11726 "it is an aspect that could be written by the most extreme promarket "
11727 "ideologue. And if you're one of these sorts (and a special one at that, 188 "
11728 "pages into a book like this), then you can see this other aspect by "
11729 "substituting \"free market\" every place I've spoken of \"free culture.\" "
11730 "The point is the same, even if the interests affecting culture are more "
11734 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11735 #: freeculture.xml:8981
11737 "The charge I've been making about the regulation of culture is the same "
11738 "charge free marketers make about regulating markets. Everyone, of course, "
11739 "concedes that some regulation of markets is necessary—at a minimum, we "
11740 "need rules of property and contract, and courts to enforce both. Likewise, "
11741 "in this culture debate, everyone concedes that at least some framework of "
11742 "copyright is also required. But both perspectives vehemently insist that "
11743 "just because some regulation is good, it doesn't follow that more regulation "
11744 "is better. And both perspectives are constantly attuned to the ways in which "
11745 "regulation simply enables the powerful industries of today to protect "
11746 "themselves against the competitors of tomorrow."
11749 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
11750 #: freeculture.xml:8993 freeculture.xml:9099
11751 msgid "Barry, Hank"
11755 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11756 #: freeculture.xml:8995
11758 "This is the single most dramatic effect of the shift in regulatory strategy "
11759 "that I described in chapter 10. The consequence of this massive threat of "
11760 "liability tied to the murky boundaries of copyright law is that innovators "
11761 "who want to innovate in this space can safely innovate only if they have the "
11762 "sign-off from last generation's dominant industries. That lesson has been "
11763 "taught through a series of cases that were designed and executed to teach "
11764 "venture capitalists a lesson. That lesson—what former Napster CEO Hank "
11765 "Barry calls a \"nuclear pall\" that has fallen over the Valley—has "
11769 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11770 #: freeculture.xml:9007
11772 "Consider one example to make the point, a story whose beginning I told in "
11773 "<citetitle>The Future of Ideas</citetitle> and which has progressed in a way "
11774 "that even I (pessimist extraordinaire) would never have predicted."
11777 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11778 #: freeculture.xml:9012
11780 "In 1997, Michael Roberts launched a company called MP3.com. MP3.com was "
11781 "keen to remake the music business. Their goal was not just to facilitate new "
11782 "ways to get access to content. Their goal was also to facilitate new ways to "
11783 "create content. Unlike the major labels, MP3.com offered creators a venue to "
11784 "distribute their creativity, without demanding an exclusive engagement from "
11788 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11789 #: freeculture.xml:9020
11791 "To make this system work, however, MP3.com needed a reliable way to "
11792 "recommend music to its users. The idea behind this alternative was to "
11793 "leverage the revealed preferences of music listeners to recommend new "
11794 "artists. If you like Lyle Lovett, you're likely to enjoy Bonnie Raitt. And "
11795 "so on. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
11798 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11799 #: freeculture.xml:9028
11801 "This idea required a simple way to gather data about user preferences. "
11802 "MP3.com came up with an extraordinarily clever way to gather this preference "
11803 "data. In January 2000, the company launched a service called "
11804 "my.mp3.com. Using software provided by MP3.com, a user would sign into an "
11805 "account and then insert into her computer a CD. The software would identify "
11806 "the CD, and then give the user access to that content. So, for example, if "
11807 "you inserted a CD by Jill Sobule, then wherever you were—at work or at "
11808 "home—you could get access to that music once you signed into your "
11809 "account. The system was therefore a kind of music-lockbox."
11813 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11814 #: freeculture.xml:9040
11816 "No doubt some could use this system to illegally copy content. But that "
11817 "opportunity existed with or without MP3.com. The aim of the my.mp3.com "
11818 "service was to give users access to their own content, and as a by-product, "
11819 "by seeing the content they already owned, to discover the kind of content "
11823 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11824 #: freeculture.xml:9049
11826 "To make this system function, however, MP3.com needed to copy 50,000 CDs to "
11827 "a server. (In principle, it could have been the user who uploaded the music, "
11828 "but that would have taken a great deal of time, and would have produced a "
11829 "product of questionable quality.) It therefore purchased 50,000 CDs from a "
11830 "store, and started the process of making copies of those CDs. Again, it "
11831 "would not serve the content from those copies to anyone except those who "
11832 "authenticated that they had a copy of the CD they wanted to access. So while "
11833 "this was 50,000 copies, it was 50,000 copies directed at giving customers "
11834 "something they had already bought."
11837 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11838 #: freeculture.xml:9064
11840 "Nine days after MP3.com launched its service, the five major labels, headed "
11841 "by the RIAA, brought a lawsuit against MP3.com. MP3.com settled with four of "
11842 "the five. Nine months later, a federal judge found MP3.com to have been "
11843 "guilty of willful infringement with respect to the fifth. Applying the law "
11844 "as it is, the judge imposed a fine against MP3.com of $118 million. MP3.com "
11845 "then settled with the remaining plaintiff, Vivendi Universal, paying over "
11846 "$54 million. Vivendi purchased MP3.com just about a year later."
11849 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11850 #: freeculture.xml:9074
11851 msgid "That part of the story I have told before. Now consider its conclusion."
11854 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11855 #: freeculture.xml:9077
11857 "After Vivendi purchased MP3.com, Vivendi turned around and filed a "
11858 "malpractice lawsuit against the lawyers who had advised it that they had a "
11859 "good faith claim that the service they wanted to offer would be considered "
11860 "legal under copyright law. This lawsuit alleged that it should have been "
11861 "obvious that the courts would find this behavior illegal; therefore, this "
11862 "lawsuit sought to punish any lawyer who had dared to suggest that the law "
11863 "was less restrictive than the labels demanded."
11867 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11868 #: freeculture.xml:9087
11870 "The clear purpose of this lawsuit (which was settled for an unspecified "
11871 "amount shortly after the story was no longer covered in the press) was to "
11872 "send an unequivocal message to lawyers advising clients in this space: It is "
11873 "not just your clients who might suffer if the content industry directs its "
11874 "guns against them. It is also you. So those of you who believe the law "
11875 "should be less restrictive should realize that such a view of the law will "
11876 "cost you and your firm dearly."
11879 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
11880 #: freeculture.xml:9098
11881 msgid "Hummer, John"
11885 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
11886 #: freeculture.xml:9107
11888 "See Joseph Menn, \"Universal, EMI Sue Napster Investor,\" <citetitle>Los "
11889 "Angeles Times</citetitle>, 23 April 2003. For a parallel argument about the "
11890 "effects on innovation in the distribution of music, see Janelle Brown, \"The "
11891 "Music Revolution Will Not Be Digitized,\" Salon.com, 1 June 2001, available "
11892 "at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #42</ulink>. See also "
11893 "Jon Healey, \"Online Music Services Besieged,\" <citetitle>Los Angeles "
11894 "Times</citetitle>, 28 May 2001."
11897 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11898 #: freeculture.xml:9101
11900 "This strategy is not just limited to the lawyers. In April 2003, Universal "
11901 "and EMI brought a lawsuit against Hummer Winblad, the venture capital firm "
11902 "(VC) that had funded Napster at a certain stage of its development, its "
11903 "cofounder ( John Hummer), and general partner (Hank Barry).<placeholder "
11904 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The claim here, as well, was that the VC should "
11905 "have recognized the right of the content industry to control how the "
11906 "industry should develop. They should be held personally liable for funding a "
11907 "company whose business turned out to be beyond the law. Here again, the aim "
11908 "of the lawsuit is transparent: Any VC now recognizes that if you fund a "
11909 "company whose business is not approved of by the dinosaurs, you are at risk "
11910 "not just in the marketplace, but in the courtroom as well. Your investment "
11911 "buys you not only a company, it also buys you a lawsuit. So extreme has the "
11912 "environment become that even car manufacturers are afraid of technologies "
11913 "that touch content. In an article in <citetitle>Business 2.0</citetitle>, "
11914 "Rafe Needleman describes a discussion with BMW:"
11917 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><indexterm><primary>
11918 #: freeculture.xml:9128
11922 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
11923 #: freeculture.xml:9143
11924 msgid "Needleman, Rafe"
11927 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
11928 #: freeculture.xml:9139
11930 "Rafe Needleman, \"Driving in Cars with MP3s,\" <citetitle>Business "
11931 "2.0</citetitle>, 16 June 2003, available at <ulink "
11932 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #43</ulink>. I am grateful to "
11933 "Dr. Mohammad Al-Ubaydli for this example. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
11937 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
11938 #: freeculture.xml:9130
11940 "I asked why, with all the storage capacity and computer power in the car, "
11941 "there was no way to play MP3 files. I was told that BMW engineers in Germany "
11942 "had rigged a new vehicle to play MP3s via the car's built-in sound system, "
11943 "but that the company's marketing and legal departments weren't comfortable "
11944 "with pushing this forward for release stateside. Even today, no new cars are "
11945 "sold in the United States with bona fide MP3 players. . . . <placeholder "
11946 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
11949 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11950 #: freeculture.xml:9148
11952 "This is the world of the mafia—filled with \"your money or your life\" "
11953 "offers, governed in the end not by courts but by the threats that the law "
11954 "empowers copyright holders to exercise. It is a system that will obviously "
11955 "and necessarily stifle new innovation. It is hard enough to start a "
11956 "company. It is impossibly hard if that company is constantly threatened by "
11961 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11962 #: freeculture.xml:9158
11964 "The point is not that businesses should have a right to start illegal "
11965 "enterprises. The point is the definition of \"illegal.\" The law is a mess "
11966 "of uncertainty. We have no good way to know how it should apply to new "
11967 "technologies. Yet by reversing our tradition of judicial deference, and by "
11968 "embracing the astonishingly high penalties that copyright law imposes, that "
11969 "uncertainty now yields a reality which is far more conservative than is "
11970 "right. If the law imposed the death penalty for parking tickets, we'd not "
11971 "only have fewer parking tickets, we'd also have much less driving. The same "
11972 "principle applies to innovation. If innovation is constantly checked by this "
11973 "uncertain and unlimited liability, we will have much less vibrant innovation "
11974 "and much less creativity."
11977 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11978 #: freeculture.xml:9173
11980 "The point is directly parallel to the crunchy-lefty point about fair "
11981 "use. Whatever the \"real\" law is, realism about the effect of law in both "
11982 "contexts is the same. This wildly punitive system of regulation will "
11983 "systematically stifle creativity and innovation. It will protect some "
11984 "industries and some creators, but it will harm industry and creativity "
11985 "generally. Free market and free culture depend upon vibrant competition. "
11986 "Yet the effect of the law today is to stifle just this kind of competition. "
11987 "The effect is to produce an overregulated culture, just as the effect of too "
11988 "much control in the market is to produce an overregulatedregulated market."
11992 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
11993 #: freeculture.xml:9185
11995 "The building of a permission culture, rather than a free culture, is the "
11996 "first important way in which the changes I have described will burden "
11997 "innovation. A permission culture means a lawyer's culture—a culture in "
11998 "which the ability to create requires a call to your lawyer. Again, I am not "
11999 "antilawyer, at least when they're kept in their proper place. I am certainly "
12000 "not antilaw. But our profession has lost the sense of its limits. And "
12001 "leaders in our profession have lost an appreciation of the high costs that "
12002 "our profession imposes upon others. The inefficiency of the law is an "
12003 "embarrassment to our tradition. And while I believe our profession should "
12004 "therefore do everything it can to make the law more efficient, it should at "
12005 "least do everything it can to limit the reach of the law where the law is "
12006 "not doing any good. The transaction costs buried within a permission culture "
12007 "are enough to bury a wide range of creativity. Someone needs to do a lot of "
12008 "justifying to justify that result. The uncertainty of the law is one burden "
12009 "on innovation. There is a second burden that operates more directly. This is "
12010 "the effort by many in the content industry to use the law to directly "
12011 "regulate the technology of the Internet so that it better protects their "
12015 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12016 #: freeculture.xml:9207
12018 "The motivation for this response is obvious. The Internet enables the "
12019 "efficient spread of content. That efficiency is a feature of the Internet's "
12020 "design. But from the perspective of the content industry, this feature is a "
12021 "\"bug.\" The efficient spread of content means that content distributors "
12022 "have a harder time controlling the distribution of content. One obvious "
12023 "response to this efficiency is thus to make the Internet less efficient. If "
12024 "the Internet enables \"piracy,\" then, this response says, we should break "
12025 "the kneecaps of the Internet."
12029 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12030 #: freeculture.xml:9221
12032 "\"Copyright and Digital Media in a Post-Napster World,\" GartnerG2 and the "
12033 "Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School (2003), "
12034 "33–35, available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
12039 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12040 #: freeculture.xml:9237
12041 msgid "GartnerG2, 26–27."
12044 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12045 #: freeculture.xml:9217
12047 "The examples of this form of legislation are many. At the urging of the "
12048 "content industry, some in Congress have threatened legislation that would "
12049 "require computers to determine whether the content they access is protected "
12050 "or not, and to disable the spread of protected content.<placeholder "
12051 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Congress has already launched proceedings to "
12052 "explore a mandatory \"broadcast flag\" that would be required on any device "
12053 "capable of transmitting digital video (i.e., a computer), and that would "
12054 "disable the copying of any content that is marked with a broadcast "
12055 "flag. Other members of Congress have proposed immunizing content providers "
12056 "from liability for technology they might deploy that would hunt down "
12057 "copyright violators and disable their machines.<placeholder "
12058 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/>"
12062 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12063 #: freeculture.xml:9242
12065 "In one sense, these solutions seem sensible. If the problem is the code, why "
12066 "not regulate the code to remove the problem. But any regulation of technical "
12067 "infrastructure will always be tuned to the particular technology of the "
12068 "day. It will impose significant burdens and costs on the technology, but "
12069 "will likely be eclipsed by advances around exactly those requirements."
12073 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12074 #: freeculture.xml:9256
12076 "See David McGuire, \"Tech Execs Square Off Over Piracy,\" Newsbytes, "
12077 "February 2002 (Entertainment)."
12080 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12081 #: freeculture.xml:9253
12083 "In March 2002, a broad coalition of technology companies, led by Intel, "
12084 "tried to get Congress to see the harm that such legislation would "
12085 "impose.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Their argument was "
12086 "obviously not that copyright should not be protected. Instead, they argued, "
12087 "any protection should not do more harm than good."
12090 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12091 #: freeculture.xml:9264
12093 "There is one more obvious way in which this war has harmed "
12094 "innovation—again, a story that will be quite familiar to the free "
12098 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12099 #: freeculture.xml:9270
12101 "Copyright may be property, but like all property, it is also a form of "
12102 "regulation. It is a regulation that benefits some and harms others. When "
12103 "done right, it benefits creators and harms leeches. When done wrong, it is "
12104 "regulation the powerful use to defeat competitors."
12107 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12108 #: freeculture.xml:9279
12110 "Jessica Litman, <citetitle>Digital Copyright</citetitle> (Amherst, N.Y.: "
12111 "Prometheus Books, 2001). <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
12114 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12115 #: freeculture.xml:9276
12117 "As I described in chapter 10, despite this feature of copyright as "
12118 "regulation, and subject to important qualifications outlined by Jessica "
12119 "Litman in her book <citetitle>Digital Copyright</citetitle>,<placeholder "
12120 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> overall this history of copyright is not "
12121 "bad. As chapter 10 details, when new technologies have come along, Congress "
12122 "has struck a balance to assure that the new is protected from the "
12123 "old. Compulsory, or statutory, licenses have been one part of that "
12124 "strategy. Free use (as in the case of the VCR) has been another."
12127 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12128 #: freeculture.xml:9290
12130 "But that pattern of deference to new technologies has now changed with the "
12131 "rise of the Internet. Rather than striking a balance between the claims of a "
12132 "new technology and the legitimate rights of content creators, both the "
12133 "courts and Congress have imposed legal restrictions that will have the "
12134 "effect of smothering the new to benefit the old."
12138 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12139 #: freeculture.xml:9299
12141 "The only circuit court exception is found in <citetitle>Recording Industry "
12142 "Association of America (RIAA)</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Diamond Multimedia "
12143 "Systems</citetitle>, 180 F. 3d 1072 (9th Cir. 1999). There the court of "
12144 "appeals for the Ninth Circuit reasoned that makers of a portable MP3 player "
12145 "were not liable for contributory copyright infringement for a device that is "
12146 "unable to record or redistribute music (a device whose only copying function "
12147 "is to render portable a music file already stored on a user's hard drive). "
12148 "At the district court level, the only exception is found in "
12149 "<citetitle>Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, "
12150 "Inc</citetitle>. v. <citetitle>Grokster, Ltd</citetitle>., 259 F. Supp. 2d "
12151 "1029 (C.D. Cal., 2003), where the court found the link between the "
12152 "distributor and any given user's conduct too attenuated to make the "
12153 "distributor liable for contributory or vicarious infringement liability."
12156 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12157 #: freeculture.xml:9317
12159 "For example, in July 2002, Representative Howard Berman introduced the "
12160 "Peer-to-Peer Piracy Prevention Act (H.R. 5211), which would immunize "
12161 "copyright holders from liability for damage done to computers when the "
12162 "copyright holders use technology to stop copyright infringement. In August "
12163 "2002, Representative Billy Tauzin introduced a bill to mandate that "
12164 "technologies capable of rebroadcasting digital copies of films broadcast on "
12165 "TV (i.e., computers) respect a \"broadcast flag\" that would disable copying "
12166 "of that content. And in March of the same year, Senator Fritz Hollings "
12167 "introduced the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act, "
12168 "which mandated copyright protection technology in all digital media "
12169 "devices. See GartnerG2, \"Copyright and Digital Media in a Post-Napster "
12170 "World,\" 27 June 2003, 33–34, available at <ulink "
12171 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #44</ulink>. <placeholder "
12172 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
12175 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12176 #: freeculture.xml:9297
12178 "The response by the courts has been fairly universal.<placeholder "
12179 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> It has been mirrored in the responses "
12180 "threatened and actually implemented by Congress. I won't catalog all of "
12181 "those responses here.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> But there is "
12182 "one example that captures the flavor of them all. This is the story of the "
12183 "demise of Internet radio."
12187 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12188 #: freeculture.xml:9339
12190 "As I described in chapter 4, when a radio station plays a song, the "
12191 "recording artist doesn't get paid for that \"radio performance\" unless he "
12192 "or she is also the composer. So, for example if Marilyn Monroe had recorded "
12193 "a version of \"Happy Birthday\"—to memorialize her famous performance "
12194 "before President Kennedy at Madison Square Garden— then whenever that "
12195 "recording was played on the radio, the current copyright owners of \"Happy "
12196 "Birthday\" would get some money, whereas Marilyn Monroe would not."
12199 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12200 #: freeculture.xml:9349
12202 "The reasoning behind this balance struck by Congress makes some sense. The "
12203 "justification was that radio was a kind of advertising. The recording artist "
12204 "thus benefited because by playing her music, the radio station was making it "
12205 "more likely that her records would be purchased. Thus, the recording artist "
12206 "got something, even if only indirectly. Probably this reasoning had less to "
12207 "do with the result than with the power of radio stations: Their lobbyists "
12208 "were quite good at stopping any efforts to get Congress to require "
12209 "compensation to the recording artists."
12212 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12213 #: freeculture.xml:9360
12215 "Enter Internet radio. Like regular radio, Internet radio is a technology to "
12216 "stream content from a broadcaster to a listener. The broadcast travels "
12217 "across the Internet, not across the ether of radio spectrum. Thus, I can "
12218 "\"tune in\" to an Internet radio station in Berlin while sitting in San "
12219 "Francisco, even though there's no way for me to tune in to a regular radio "
12220 "station much beyond the San Francisco metropolitan area."
12223 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12224 #: freeculture.xml:9369
12226 "This feature of the architecture of Internet radio means that there are "
12227 "potentially an unlimited number of radio stations that a user could tune in "
12228 "to using her computer, whereas under the existing architecture for broadcast "
12229 "radio, there is an obvious limit to the number of broadcasters and clear "
12230 "broadcast frequencies. Internet radio could therefore be more competitive "
12231 "than regular radio; it could provide a wider range of selections. And "
12232 "because the potential audience for Internet radio is the whole world, niche "
12233 "stations could easily develop and market their content to a relatively large "
12234 "number of users worldwide. According to some estimates, more than eighty "
12235 "million users worldwide have tuned in to this new form of radio."
12239 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12240 #: freeculture.xml:9384
12242 "Internet radio is thus to radio what FM was to AM. It is an improvement "
12243 "potentially vastly more significant than the FM improvement over AM, since "
12244 "not only is the technology better, so, too, is the competition. Indeed, "
12245 "there is a direct parallel between the fight to establish FM radio and the "
12246 "fight to protect Internet radio. As one author describes Howard Armstrong's "
12247 "struggle to enable FM radio,"
12251 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
12252 #: freeculture.xml:9408
12253 msgid "Lessing, 239."
12256 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
12257 #: freeculture.xml:9394
12259 "An almost unlimited number of FM stations was possible in the shortwaves, "
12260 "thus ending the unnatural restrictions imposed on radio in the crowded "
12261 "longwaves. If FM were freely developed, the number of stations would be "
12262 "limited only by economics and competition rather than by technical "
12263 "restrictions. . . . Armstrong likened the situation that had grown up in "
12264 "radio to that following the invention of the printing press, when "
12265 "governments and ruling interests attempted to control this new instrument of "
12266 "mass communications by imposing restrictive licenses on it. This tyranny was "
12267 "broken only when it became possible for men freely to acquire printing "
12268 "presses and freely to run them. FM in this sense was as great an invention "
12269 "as the printing presses, for it gave radio the opportunity to strike off its "
12270 "shackles.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
12274 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12275 #: freeculture.xml:9418
12276 msgid "Ibid., 229."
12279 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12280 #: freeculture.xml:9413
12282 "This potential for FM radio was never realized—not because Armstrong "
12283 "was wrong about the technology, but because he underestimated the power of "
12284 "\"vested interests, habits, customs and legislation\"<placeholder "
12285 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> to retard the growth of this competing "
12289 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12290 #: freeculture.xml:9423
12292 "Now the very same claim could be made about Internet radio. For again, there "
12293 "is no technical limitation that could restrict the number of Internet radio "
12294 "stations. The only restrictions on Internet radio are those imposed by the "
12295 "law. Copyright law is one such law. So the first question we should ask is, "
12296 "what copyright rules would govern Internet radio?"
12300 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12301 #: freeculture.xml:9431
12303 "But here the power of the lobbyists is reversed. Internet radio is a new "
12304 "industry. The recording artists, on the other hand, have a very powerful "
12305 "lobby, the RIAA. Thus when Congress considered the phenomenon of Internet "
12306 "radio in 1995, the lobbyists had primed Congress to adopt a different rule "
12307 "for Internet radio than the rule that applies to terrestrial radio. While "
12308 "terrestrial radio does not have to pay our hypothetical Marilyn Monroe when "
12309 "it plays her hypothetical recording of \"Happy Birthday\" on the air, "
12310 "<emphasis>Internet radio does</emphasis>. Not only is the law not neutral "
12311 "toward Internet radio—the law actually burdens Internet radio more "
12312 "than it burdens terrestrial radio."
12315 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
12316 #: freeculture.xml:9470
12317 msgid "CARP (Copyright Arbitration Royalty Panel)"
12320 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12321 #: freeculture.xml:9453
12323 "This example was derived from fees set by the original Copyright Arbitration "
12324 "Royalty Panel (CARP) proceedings, and is drawn from an example offered by "
12325 "Professor William Fisher. Conference Proceedings, iLaw (Stanford), 3 July "
12326 "2003, on file with author. Professors Fisher and Zittrain submitted "
12327 "testimony in the CARP proceeding that was ultimately rejected. See Jonathan "
12328 "Zittrain, Digital Performance Right in Sound Recordings and Ephemeral "
12329 "Recordings, Docket No. 2000-9, CARP DTRA 1 and 2, available at <ulink "
12330 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #45</ulink>. For an excellent "
12331 "analysis making a similar point, see Randal C. Picker, \"Copyright as Entry "
12332 "Policy: The Case of Digital Distribution,\" <citetitle>Antitrust "
12333 "Bulletin</citetitle> (Summer/Fall 2002): 461: \"This was not confusion, "
12334 "these are just old-fashioned entry barriers. Analog radio stations are "
12335 "protected from digital entrants, reducing entry in radio and diversity. Yes, "
12336 "this is done in the name of getting royalties to copyright holders, but, "
12337 "absent the play of powerful interests, that could have been done in a "
12338 "media-neutral way.\" <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder "
12339 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
12342 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12343 #: freeculture.xml:9446
12345 "This financial burden is not slight. As Harvard law professor William Fisher "
12346 "estimates, if an Internet radio station distributed adfree popular music to "
12347 "(on average) ten thousand listeners, twenty-four hours a day, the total "
12348 "artist fees that radio station would owe would be over $1 million a "
12349 "year.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> A regular radio station "
12350 "broadcasting the same content would pay no equivalent fee."
12353 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12354 #: freeculture.xml:9477
12356 "The burden is not financial only. Under the original rules that were "
12357 "proposed, an Internet radio station (but not a terrestrial radio station) "
12358 "would have to collect the following data from <emphasis>every listening "
12359 "transaction</emphasis>:"
12362 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12363 #: freeculture.xml:9485
12364 msgid "name of the service;"
12367 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12368 #: freeculture.xml:9488
12369 msgid "channel of the program (AM/FM stations use station ID);"
12372 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12373 #: freeculture.xml:9491
12374 msgid "type of program (archived/looped/live);"
12377 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12378 #: freeculture.xml:9494
12379 msgid "date of transmission;"
12382 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12383 #: freeculture.xml:9497
12384 msgid "time of transmission;"
12387 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12388 #: freeculture.xml:9500
12389 msgid "time zone of origination of transmission;"
12392 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12393 #: freeculture.xml:9503
12394 msgid "numeric designation of the place of the sound recording within the program;"
12397 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12398 #: freeculture.xml:9506
12399 msgid "duration of transmission (to nearest second);"
12402 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12403 #: freeculture.xml:9509
12404 msgid "sound recording title;"
12407 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12408 #: freeculture.xml:9512
12409 msgid "ISRC code of the recording;"
12412 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12413 #: freeculture.xml:9515
12415 "release year of the album per copyright notice and in the case of "
12416 "compilation albums, the release year of the album and copy- right date of "
12420 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12421 #: freeculture.xml:9518
12422 msgid "featured recording artist;"
12425 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12426 #: freeculture.xml:9521
12427 msgid "retail album title;"
12430 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12431 #: freeculture.xml:9524
12432 msgid "recording label;"
12435 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12436 #: freeculture.xml:9527
12437 msgid "UPC code of the retail album;"
12440 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12441 #: freeculture.xml:9530
12442 msgid "catalog number;"
12445 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12446 #: freeculture.xml:9533
12447 msgid "copyright owner information;"
12450 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12451 #: freeculture.xml:9536
12452 msgid "musical genre of the channel or program (station format);"
12455 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12456 #: freeculture.xml:9539
12457 msgid "name of the service or entity;"
12460 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12461 #: freeculture.xml:9542
12462 msgid "channel or program;"
12465 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12466 #: freeculture.xml:9545
12467 msgid "date and time that the user logged in (in the user's time zone);"
12470 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12471 #: freeculture.xml:9548
12472 msgid "date and time that the user logged out (in the user's time zone);"
12475 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12476 #: freeculture.xml:9551
12477 msgid "time zone where the signal was received (user);"
12480 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12481 #: freeculture.xml:9554
12482 msgid "Unique User identifier;"
12485 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
12486 #: freeculture.xml:9557
12487 msgid "the country in which the user received the transmissions."
12490 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12491 #: freeculture.xml:9562
12493 "The Librarian of Congress eventually suspended these reporting requirements, "
12494 "pending further study. And he also changed the original rates set by the "
12495 "arbitration panel charged with setting rates. But the basic difference "
12496 "between Internet radio and terrestrial radio remains: Internet radio has to "
12497 "pay a <emphasis>type of copyright fee</emphasis> that terrestrial radio does "
12501 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12502 #: freeculture.xml:9570
12504 "Why? What justifies this difference? Was there any study of the economic "
12505 "consequences from Internet radio that would justify these differences? Was "
12506 "the motive to protect artists against piracy?"
12509 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12510 #: freeculture.xml:9576
12512 "In a rare bit of candor, one RIAA expert admitted what seemed obvious to "
12513 "everyone at the time. As Alex Alben, vice president for Public Policy at "
12514 "Real Networks, told me,"
12518 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
12519 #: freeculture.xml:9582
12521 "The RIAA, which was representing the record labels, presented some testimony "
12522 "about what they thought a willing buyer would pay to a willing seller, and "
12523 "it was much higher. It was ten times higher than what radio stations pay to "
12524 "perform the same songs for the same period of time. And so the attorneys "
12525 "representing the webcasters asked the RIAA, . . . \"How do you come up with "
12526 "a rate that's so much higher? Why is it worth more than radio? Because here "
12527 "we have hundreds of thousands of webcasters who want to pay, and that should "
12528 "establish the market rate, and if you set the rate so high, you're going to "
12529 "drive the small webcasters out of business. . . .\""
12532 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
12533 #: freeculture.xml:9598
12535 "And the RIAA experts said, \"Well, we don't really model this as an industry "
12536 "with thousands of webcasters, <emphasis>we think it should be an industry "
12537 "with, you know, five or seven big players who can pay a high rate and it's a "
12538 "stable, predictable market</emphasis>.\" (Emphasis added.)"
12541 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12542 #: freeculture.xml:9606
12544 "Translation: The aim is to use the law to eliminate competition, so that "
12545 "this platform of potentially immense competition, which would cause the "
12546 "diversity and range of content available to explode, would not cause pain to "
12547 "the dinosaurs of old. There is no one, on either the right or the left, who "
12548 "should endorse this use of the law. And yet there is practically no one, on "
12549 "either the right or the left, who is doing anything effective to prevent it."
12552 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><title>
12553 #: freeculture.xml:9616
12554 msgid "Corrupting Citizens"
12557 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12558 #: freeculture.xml:9618
12560 "Overregulation stifles creativity. It smothers innovation. It gives "
12561 "dinosaurs a veto over the future. It wastes the extraordinary opportunity "
12562 "for a democratic creativity that digital technology enables."
12565 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12566 #: freeculture.xml:9624
12568 "In addition to these important harms, there is one more that was important "
12569 "to our forebears, but seems forgotten today. Overregulation corrupts "
12570 "citizens and weakens the rule of law."
12574 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12575 #: freeculture.xml:9633
12577 "Mike Graziano and Lee Rainie, \"The Music Downloading Deluge,\" Pew Internet "
12578 "and American Life Project (24 April 2001), available at <ulink "
12579 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #46</ulink>. The Pew Internet "
12580 "and American Life Project reported that 37 million Americans had downloaded "
12581 "music files from the Internet by early 2001."
12585 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12586 #: freeculture.xml:9629
12588 "The war that is being waged today is a war of prohibition. As with every war "
12589 "of prohibition, it is targeted against the behavior of a very large number "
12590 "of citizens. According to <citetitle>The New York Times</citetitle>, 43 "
12591 "million Americans downloaded music in May 2002.<placeholder "
12592 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> According to the RIAA, the behavior of those 43 "
12593 "million Americans is a felony. We thus have a set of rules that transform 20 "
12594 "percent of America into criminals. As the RIAA launches lawsuits against not "
12595 "only the Napsters and Kazaas of the world, but against students building "
12596 "search engines, and increasingly against ordinary users downloading content, "
12597 "the technologies for sharing will advance to further protect and hide "
12598 "illegal use. It is an arms race or a civil war, with the extremes of one "
12599 "side inviting a more extreme response by the other."
12603 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12604 #: freeculture.xml:9667
12606 "Alex Pham, \"The Labels Strike Back: N.Y. Girl Settles RIAA Case,\" "
12607 "<citetitle>Los Angeles Times</citetitle>, 10 September 2003, Business."
12610 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12611 #: freeculture.xml:9654
12613 "The content industry's tactics exploit the failings of the American legal "
12614 "system. When the RIAA brought suit against Jesse Jordan, it knew that in "
12615 "Jordan it had found a scapegoat, not a defendant. The threat of having to "
12616 "pay either all the money in the world in damages ($15,000,000) or almost all "
12617 "the money in the world to defend against paying all the money in the world "
12618 "in damages ($250,000 in legal fees) led Jordan to choose to pay all the "
12619 "money he had in the world ($12,000) to make the suit go away. The same "
12620 "strategy animates the RIAA's suits against individual users. In September "
12621 "2003, the RIAA sued 261 individuals—including a twelve-year-old girl "
12622 "living in public housing and a seventy-year-old man who had no idea what "
12623 "file sharing was.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> As these "
12624 "scapegoats discovered, it will always cost more to defend against these "
12625 "suits than it would cost to simply settle. (The twelve year old, for "
12626 "example, like Jesse Jordan, paid her life savings of $2,000 to settle the "
12627 "case.) Our law is an awful system for defending rights. It is an "
12628 "embarrassment to our tradition. And the consequence of our law as it is, is "
12629 "that those with the power can use the law to quash any rights they oppose."
12633 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12634 #: freeculture.xml:9689
12636 "Jeffrey A. Miron and Jeffrey Zwiebel, \"Alcohol Consumption During "
12637 "Prohibition,\" <citetitle>American Economic Review</citetitle> 81, no. 2 "
12642 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12643 #: freeculture.xml:9697
12645 "National Drug Control Policy: Hearing Before the House Government Reform "
12646 "Committee, 108th Cong., 1st sess. (5 March 2003) (statement of John "
12647 "P. Walters, director of National Drug Control Policy)."
12651 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12652 #: freeculture.xml:9707
12654 "See James Andreoni, Brian Erard, and Jonathon Feinstein, \"Tax Compliance,\" "
12655 "<citetitle>Journal of Economic Literature</citetitle> 36 (1998): 818 (survey "
12656 "of compliance literature)."
12659 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12660 #: freeculture.xml:9679
12662 "Wars of prohibition are nothing new in America. This one is just something "
12663 "more extreme than anything we've seen before. We experimented with alcohol "
12664 "prohibition, at a time when the per capita consumption of alcohol was 1.5 "
12665 "gallons per capita per year. The war against drinking initially reduced that "
12666 "consumption to just 30 percent of its preprohibition levels, but by the end "
12667 "of prohibition, consumption was up to 70 percent of the preprohibition "
12668 "level. Americans were drinking just about as much, but now, a vast number "
12669 "were criminals.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> We have launched a "
12670 "war on drugs aimed at reducing the consumption of regulated narcotics that 7 "
12671 "percent (or 16 million) Americans now use.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
12672 "id=\"1\"/> That is a drop from the high (so to speak) in 1979 of 14 percent "
12673 "of the population. We regulate automobiles to the point where the vast "
12674 "majority of Americans violate the law every day. We run such a complex tax "
12675 "system that a majority of cash businesses regularly cheat.<placeholder "
12676 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"2\"/> We pride ourselves on our \"free society,\" but "
12677 "an endless array of ordinary behavior is regulated within our society. And "
12678 "as a result, a huge proportion of Americans regularly violate at least some "
12682 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12683 #: freeculture.xml:9716
12685 "This state of affairs is not without consequence. It is a particularly "
12686 "salient issue for teachers like me, whose job it is to teach law students "
12687 "about the importance of \"ethics.\" As my colleague Charlie Nesson told a "
12688 "class at Stanford, each year law schools admit thousands of students who "
12689 "have illegally downloaded music, illegally consumed alcohol and sometimes "
12690 "drugs, illegally worked without paying taxes, illegally driven cars. These "
12691 "are kids for whom behaving illegally is increasingly the norm. And then we, "
12692 "as law professors, are supposed to teach them how to behave "
12693 "ethically—how to say no to bribes, or keep client funds separate, or "
12694 "honor a demand to disclose a document that will mean that your case is "
12695 "over. Generations of Americans—more significantly in some parts of "
12696 "America than in others, but still, everywhere in America today—can't "
12697 "live their lives both normally and legally, since \"normally\" entails a "
12698 "certain degree of illegality."
12701 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12702 #: freeculture.xml:9733
12704 "The response to this general illegality is either to enforce the law more "
12705 "severely or to change the law. We, as a society, have to learn how to make "
12706 "that choice more rationally. Whether a law makes sense depends, in part, at "
12707 "least, upon whether the costs of the law, both intended and collateral, "
12708 "outweigh the benefits. If the costs, intended and collateral, do outweigh "
12709 "the benefits, then the law ought to be changed. Alternatively, if the costs "
12710 "of the existing system are much greater than the costs of an alternative, "
12711 "then we have a good reason to consider the alternative."
12715 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12716 #: freeculture.xml:9746
12718 "My point is not the idiotic one: Just because people violate a law, we "
12719 "should therefore repeal it. Obviously, we could reduce murder statistics "
12720 "dramatically by legalizing murder on Wednesdays and Fridays. But that "
12721 "wouldn't make any sense, since murder is wrong every day of the week. A "
12722 "society is right to ban murder always and everywhere."
12725 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12726 #: freeculture.xml:9753
12728 "My point is instead one that democracies understood for generations, but "
12729 "that we recently have learned to forget. The rule of law depends upon people "
12730 "obeying the law. The more often, and more repeatedly, we as citizens "
12731 "experience violating the law, the less we respect the law. Obviously, in "
12732 "most cases, the important issue is the law, not respect for the law. I don't "
12733 "care whether the rapist respects the law or not; I want to catch and "
12734 "incarcerate the rapist. But I do care whether my students respect the "
12735 "law. And I do care if the rules of law sow increasing disrespect because of "
12736 "the extreme of regulation they impose. Twenty million Americans have come "
12737 "of age since the Internet introduced this different idea of \"sharing.\" We "
12738 "need to be able to call these twenty million Americans \"citizens,\" not "
12742 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12743 #: freeculture.xml:9767
12745 "When at least forty-three million citizens download content from the "
12746 "Internet, and when they use tools to combine that content in ways "
12747 "unauthorized by copyright holders, the first question we should be asking is "
12748 "not how best to involve the FBI. The first question should be whether this "
12749 "particular prohibition is really necessary in order to achieve the proper "
12750 "ends that copyright law serves. Is there another way to assure that artists "
12751 "get paid without transforming forty-three million Americans into felons? "
12752 "Does it make sense if there are other ways to assure that artists get paid "
12753 "without transforming America into a nation of felons?"
12756 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12757 #: freeculture.xml:9779
12758 msgid "This abstract point can be made more clear with a particular example."
12762 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12763 #: freeculture.xml:9782
12765 "We all own CDs. Many of us still own phonograph records. These pieces of "
12766 "plastic encode music that in a certain sense we have bought. The law "
12767 "protects our right to buy and sell that plastic: It is not a copyright "
12768 "infringement for me to sell all my classical records at a used record store "
12769 "and buy jazz records to replace them. That \"use\" of the recordings is "
12773 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12774 #: freeculture.xml:9793
12776 "But as the MP3 craze has demonstrated, there is another use of phonograph "
12777 "records that is effectively free. Because these recordings were made without "
12778 "copy-protection technologies, I am \"free\" to copy, or \"rip,\" music from "
12779 "my records onto a computer hard disk. Indeed, Apple Corporation went so far "
12780 "as to suggest that \"freedom\" was a right: In a series of commercials, "
12781 "Apple endorsed the \"Rip, Mix, Burn\" capacities of digital technologies."
12784 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><indexterm><primary>
12785 #: freeculture.xml:9801
12789 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12790 #: freeculture.xml:9803
12792 "This \"use\" of my records is certainly valuable. I have begun a large "
12793 "process at home of ripping all of my and my wife's CDs, and storing them in "
12794 "one archive. Then, using Apple's iTunes, or a wonderful program called "
12795 "Andromeda, we can build different play lists of our music: Bach, Baroque, "
12796 "Love Songs, Love Songs of Significant Others—the potential is "
12797 "endless. And by reducing the costs of mixing play lists, these technologies "
12798 "help build a creativity with play lists that is itself independently "
12799 "valuable. Compilations of songs are creative and meaningful in their own "
12803 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12804 #: freeculture.xml:9814
12806 "This use is enabled by unprotected media—either CDs or records. But "
12807 "unprotected media also enable file sharing. File sharing threatens (or so "
12808 "the content industry believes) the ability of creators to earn a fair return "
12809 "from their creativity. And thus, many are beginning to experiment with "
12810 "technologies to eliminate unprotected media. These technologies, for "
12811 "example, would enable CDs that could not be ripped. Or they might enable spy "
12812 "programs to identify ripped content on people's machines."
12816 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12817 #: freeculture.xml:9824
12819 "If these technologies took off, then the building of large archives of your "
12820 "own music would become quite difficult. You might hang in hacker circles, "
12821 "and get technology to disable the technologies that protect the "
12822 "content. Trading in those technologies is illegal, but maybe that doesn't "
12823 "bother you much. In any case, for the vast majority of people, these "
12824 "protection technologies would effectively destroy the archiving use of "
12825 "CDs. The technology, in other words, would force us all back to the world "
12826 "where we either listened to music by manipulating pieces of plastic or were "
12827 "part of a massively complex \"digital rights management\" system."
12830 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12831 #: freeculture.xml:9838
12833 "If the only way to assure that artists get paid were the elimination of the "
12834 "ability to freely move content, then these technologies to interfere with "
12835 "the freedom to move content would be justifiable. But what if there were "
12836 "another way to assure that artists are paid, without locking down any "
12837 "content? What if, in other words, a different system could assure "
12838 "compensation to artists while also preserving the freedom to move content "
12842 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12843 #: freeculture.xml:9847
12845 "My point just now is not to prove that there is such a system. I offer a "
12846 "version of such a system in the last chapter of this book. For now, the only "
12847 "point is the relatively uncontroversial one: If a different system achieved "
12848 "the same legitimate objectives that the existing copyright system achieved, "
12849 "but left consumers and creators much more free, then we'd have a very good "
12850 "reason to pursue this alternative—namely, freedom. The choice, in "
12851 "other words, would not be between property and piracy; the choice would be "
12852 "between different property systems and the freedoms each allowed."
12855 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12856 #: freeculture.xml:9858
12858 "I believe there is a way to assure that artists are paid without turning "
12859 "forty-three million Americans into felons. But the salient feature of this "
12860 "alternative is that it would lead to a very different market for producing "
12861 "and distributing creativity. The dominant few, who today control the vast "
12862 "majority of the distribution of content in the world, would no longer "
12863 "exercise this extreme of control. Rather, they would go the way of the "
12864 "horse-drawn buggy."
12867 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12868 #: freeculture.xml:9867
12870 "Except that this generation's buggy manufacturers have already saddled "
12871 "Congress, and are riding the law to protect themselves against this new form "
12872 "of competition. For them the choice is between fortythree million Americans "
12873 "as criminals and their own survival."
12876 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12877 #: freeculture.xml:9873
12879 "It is understandable why they choose as they do. It is not understandable "
12880 "why we as a democracy continue to choose as we do. Jack Valenti is charming; "
12881 "but not so charming as to justify giving up a tradition as deep and "
12882 "important as our tradition of free culture. There's one more aspect to this "
12883 "corruption that is particularly important to civil liberties, and follows "
12884 "directly from any war of prohibition. As Electronic Frontier Foundation "
12885 "attorney Fred von Lohmann describes, this is the \"collateral damage\" that "
12886 "\"arises whenever you turn a very large percentage of the population into "
12887 "criminals.\" This is the collateral damage to civil liberties generally. "
12888 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
12891 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><indexterm><primary>
12892 #: freeculture.xml:9892 freeculture.xml:10001
12893 msgid "von Lohmann, Fred"
12896 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12897 #: freeculture.xml:9890
12899 "\"If you can treat someone as a putative lawbreaker,\" von Lohmann explains, "
12900 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
12903 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
12904 #: freeculture.xml:9896
12906 "then all of a sudden a lot of basic civil liberty protections evaporate to "
12907 "one degree or another. . . . If you're a copyright infringer, how can you "
12908 "hope to have any privacy rights? If you're a copyright infringer, how can "
12909 "you hope to be secure against seizures of your computer? How can you hope to "
12910 "continue to receive Internet access? . . . Our sensibilities change as soon "
12911 "as we think, \"Oh, well, but that person's a criminal, a lawbreaker.\" Well, "
12912 "what this campaign against file sharing has done is turn a remarkable "
12913 "percentage of the American Internet-using population into \"lawbreakers.\""
12916 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12917 #: freeculture.xml:9908
12919 "And the consequence of this transformation of the American public into "
12920 "criminals is that it becomes trivial, as a matter of due process, to "
12921 "effectively erase much of the privacy most would presume."
12924 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12925 #: freeculture.xml:9913
12927 "Users of the Internet began to see this generally in 2003 as the RIAA "
12928 "launched its campaign to force Internet service providers to turn over the "
12929 "names of customers who the RIAA believed were violating copyright "
12930 "law. Verizon fought that demand and lost. With a simple request to a judge, "
12931 "and without any notice to the customer at all, the identity of an Internet "
12932 "user is revealed."
12936 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12937 #: freeculture.xml:9931
12939 "See Frank Ahrens, \"RIAA's Lawsuits Meet Surprised Targets; Single Mother in "
12940 "Calif., 12-Year-Old Girl in N.Y. Among Defendants,\" <citetitle>Washington "
12941 "Post</citetitle>, 10 September 2003, E1; Chris Cobbs, \"Worried Parents Pull "
12942 "Plug on File `Stealing'; With the Music Industry Cracking Down on File "
12943 "Swapping, Parents are Yanking Software from Home PCs to Avoid Being Sued,\" "
12944 "<citetitle>Orlando Sentinel Tribune</citetitle>, 30 August 2003, C1; "
12945 "Jefferson Graham, \"Recording Industry Sues Parents,\" <citetitle>USA "
12946 "Today</citetitle>, 15 September 2003, 4D; John Schwartz, \"She Says She's No "
12947 "Music Pirate. No Snoop Fan, Either,\" <citetitle>New York Times</citetitle>, "
12948 "25 September 2003, C1; Margo Varadi, \"Is Brianna a Criminal?\" "
12949 "<citetitle>Toronto Star</citetitle>, 18 September 2003, P7."
12952 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12953 #: freeculture.xml:9922
12955 "The RIAA then expanded this campaign, by announcing a general strategy to "
12956 "sue individual users of the Internet who are alleged to have downloaded "
12957 "copyrighted music from file-sharing systems. But as we've seen, the "
12958 "potential damages from these suits are astronomical: If a family's computer "
12959 "is used to download a single CD's worth of music, the family could be liable "
12960 "for $2 million in damages. That didn't stop the RIAA from suing a number of "
12961 "these families, just as they had sued Jesse Jordan.<placeholder "
12962 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
12966 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12967 #: freeculture.xml:9949
12969 "See \"Revealed: How RIAA Tracks Downloaders: Music Industry Discloses Some "
12970 "Methods Used,\" CNN.com, available at <ulink "
12971 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #47</ulink>."
12974 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
12975 #: freeculture.xml:9945
12977 "Even this understates the espionage that is being waged by the RIAA. A "
12978 "report from CNN late last summer described a strategy the RIAA had adopted "
12979 "to track Napster users.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Using a "
12980 "sophisticated hashing algorithm, the RIAA took what is in effect a "
12981 "fingerprint of every song in the Napster catalog. Any copy of one of those "
12982 "MP3s will have the same \"fingerprint.\""
12986 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para><footnote><para>
12987 #: freeculture.xml:9970
12989 "See Jeff Adler, \"Cambridge: On Campus, Pirates Are Not Penitent,\" "
12990 "<citetitle>Boston Globe</citetitle>, 18 May 2003, City Weekly, 1; Frank "
12991 "Ahrens, \"Four Students Sued over Music Sites; Industry Group Targets File "
12992 "Sharing at Colleges,\" <citetitle>Washington Post</citetitle>, 4 April 2003, "
12993 "E1; Elizabeth Armstrong, \"Students `Rip, Mix, Burn' at Their Own Risk,\" "
12994 "<citetitle>Christian Science Monitor</citetitle>, 2 September 2003, 20; "
12995 "Robert Becker and Angela Rozas, \"Music Pirate Hunt Turns to Loyola; Two "
12996 "Students Names Are Handed Over; Lawsuit Possible,\" <citetitle>Chicago "
12997 "Tribune</citetitle>, 16 July 2003, 1C; Beth Cox, \"RIAA Trains Antipiracy "
12998 "Guns on Universities,\" <citetitle>Internet News</citetitle>, 30 January "
12999 "2003, available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
13000 "#48</ulink>; Benny Evangelista, \"Download Warning 101: Freshman Orientation "
13001 "This Fall to Include Record Industry Warnings Against File Sharing,\" "
13002 "<citetitle>San Francisco Chronicle</citetitle>, 11 August 2003, E11; \"Raid, "
13003 "Letters Are Weapons at Universities,\" <citetitle>USA Today</citetitle>, 26 "
13004 "September 2000, 3D."
13007 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
13008 #: freeculture.xml:9958
13010 "So imagine the following not-implausible scenario: Imagine a friend gives a "
13011 "CD to your daughter—a collection of songs just like the cassettes you "
13012 "used to make as a kid. You don't know, and neither does your daughter, where "
13013 "these songs came from. But she copies these songs onto her computer. She "
13014 "then takes her computer to college and connects it to a college network, and "
13015 "if the college network is \"cooperating\" with the RIAA's espionage, and she "
13016 "hasn't properly protected her content from the network (do you know how to "
13017 "do that yourself ?), then the RIAA will be able to identify your daughter as "
13018 "a \"criminal.\" And under the rules that universities are beginning to "
13019 "deploy,<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> your daughter can lose the "
13020 "right to use the university's computer network. She can, in some cases, be "
13024 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
13025 #: freeculture.xml:9989
13027 "Now, of course, she'll have the right to defend herself. You can hire a "
13028 "lawyer for her (at $300 per hour, if you're lucky), and she can plead that "
13029 "she didn't know anything about the source of the songs or that they came "
13030 "from Napster. And it may well be that the university believes her. But the "
13031 "university might not believe her. It might treat this \"contraband\" as "
13032 "presumptive of guilt. And as any number of college students have already "
13033 "learned, our presumptions about innocence disappear in the middle of wars of "
13034 "prohibition. This war is no different. Says von Lohmann, <placeholder "
13035 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
13038 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><blockquote><para>
13039 #: freeculture.xml:10005
13041 "So when we're talking about numbers like forty to sixty million Americans "
13042 "that are essentially copyright infringers, you create a situation where the "
13043 "civil liberties of those people are very much in peril in a general "
13044 "matter. [I don't] think [there is any] analog where you could randomly "
13045 "choose any person off the street and be confident that they were committing "
13046 "an unlawful act that could put them on the hook for potential felony "
13047 "liability or hundreds of millions of dollars of civil liability. Certainly "
13048 "we all speed, but speeding isn't the kind of an act for which we routinely "
13049 "forfeit civil liberties. Some people use drugs, and I think that's the "
13050 "closest analog, [but] many have noted that the war against drugs has eroded "
13051 "all of our civil liberties because it's treated so many Americans as "
13052 "criminals. Well, I think it's fair to say that file sharing is an order of "
13053 "magnitude larger number of Americans than drug use. . . . If forty to sixty "
13054 "million Americans have become lawbreakers, then we're really on a slippery "
13055 "slope to lose a lot of civil liberties for all forty to sixty million of "
13059 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><section><para>
13060 #: freeculture.xml:10025
13062 "When forty to sixty million Americans are considered \"criminals\" under the "
13063 "law, and when the law could achieve the same objective— securing "
13064 "rights to authors—without these millions being considered "
13065 "\"criminals,\" who is the villain? Americans or the law? Which is American, "
13066 "a constant war on our own people or a concerted effort through our democracy "
13067 "to change our law?"
13070 #. type: Content of: <book><part><title>
13071 #: freeculture.xml:10038
13075 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
13076 #: freeculture.xml:10043
13078 "So here's the picture: You're standing at the side of the road. Your car is "
13079 "on fire. You are angry and upset because in part you helped start the "
13080 "fire. Now you don't know how to put it out. Next to you is a bucket, filled "
13081 "with gasoline. Obviously, gasoline won't put the fire out."
13084 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
13085 #: freeculture.xml:10049
13087 "As you ponder the mess, someone else comes along. In a panic, she grabs the "
13088 "bucket. Before you have a chance to tell her to stop—or before she "
13089 "understands just why she should stop—the bucket is in the air. The "
13090 "gasoline is about to hit the blazing car. And the fire that gasoline will "
13091 "ignite is about to ignite everything around."
13094 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
13095 #: freeculture.xml:10057
13097 "A war about copyright rages all around—and we're all focusing on the "
13098 "wrong thing. No doubt, current technologies threaten existing businesses. "
13099 "No doubt they may threaten artists. But technologies change. The industry "
13100 "and technologists have plenty of ways to use technology to protect "
13101 "themselves against the current threats of the Internet. This is a fire that "
13102 "if let alone would burn itself out."
13106 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
13107 #: freeculture.xml:10066
13109 "Yet policy makers are not willing to leave this fire to itself. Primed with "
13110 "plenty of lobbyists' money, they are keen to intervene to eliminate the "
13111 "problem they perceive. But the problem they perceive is not the real threat "
13112 "this culture faces. For while we watch this small fire in the corner, there "
13113 "is a massive change in the way culture is made that is happening all around."
13116 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
13117 #: freeculture.xml:10074
13119 "Somehow we have to find a way to turn attention to this more important and "
13120 "fundamental issue. Somehow we have to find a way to avoid pouring gasoline "
13124 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
13125 #: freeculture.xml:10079
13127 "We have not found that way yet. Instead, we seem trapped in a simpler, "
13128 "binary view. However much many people push to frame this debate more "
13129 "broadly, it is the simple, binary view that remains. We rubberneck to look "
13130 "at the fire when we should be keeping our eyes on the road."
13133 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
13134 #: freeculture.xml:10085
13136 "This challenge has been my life these last few years. It has also been my "
13137 "failure. In the two chapters that follow, I describe one small brace of "
13138 "efforts, so far failed, to find a way to refocus this debate. We must "
13139 "understand these failures if we're to understand what success will require."
13142 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
13143 #: freeculture.xml:10095
13144 msgid "CHAPTER THIRTEEN: Eldred"
13147 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13148 #: freeculture.xml:10097
13150 "In 1995, a father was frustrated that his daughters didn't seem to like "
13151 "Hawthorne. No doubt there was more than one such father, but at least one "
13152 "did something about it. Eric Eldred, a retired computer programmer living in "
13153 "New Hampshire, decided to put Hawthorne on the Web. An electronic version, "
13154 "Eldred thought, with links to pictures and explanatory text, would make this "
13155 "nineteenth-century author's work come alive."
13158 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13159 #: freeculture.xml:10106
13161 "It didn't work—at least for his daughters. They didn't find Hawthorne "
13162 "any more interesting than before. But Eldred's experiment gave birth to a "
13163 "hobby, and his hobby begat a cause: Eldred would build a library of public "
13164 "domain works by scanning these works and making them available for free."
13168 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13169 #: freeculture.xml:10113
13171 "Eldred's library was not simply a copy of certain public domain works, "
13172 "though even a copy would have been of great value to people across the world "
13173 "who can't get access to printed versions of these works. Instead, Eldred was "
13174 "producing derivative works from these public domain works. Just as Disney "
13175 "turned Grimm into stories more accessible to the twentieth century, Eldred "
13176 "transformed Hawthorne, and many others, into a form more "
13177 "accessible—technically accessible—today."
13180 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13181 #: freeculture.xml:10124
13183 "Eldred's freedom to do this with Hawthorne's work grew from the same source "
13184 "as Disney's. Hawthorne's <citetitle>Scarlet Letter</citetitle> had passed "
13185 "into the public domain in 1907. It was free for anyone to take without the "
13186 "permission of the Hawthorne estate or anyone else. Some, such as Dover Press "
13187 "and Penguin Classics, take works from the public domain and produce printed "
13188 "editions, which they sell in bookstores across the country. Others, such as "
13189 "Disney, take these stories and turn them into animated cartoons, sometimes "
13190 "successfully (<citetitle>Cinderella</citetitle>), sometimes not "
13191 "(<citetitle>The Hunchback of Notre Dame</citetitle>, <citetitle>Treasure "
13192 "Planet</citetitle>). These are all commercial publications of public domain "
13197 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13198 #: freeculture.xml:10147
13200 "There's a parallel here with pornography that is a bit hard to describe, but "
13201 "it's a strong one. One phenomenon that the Internet created was a world of "
13202 "noncommercial pornographers—people who were distributing porn but were "
13203 "not making money directly or indirectly from that distribution. Such a "
13204 "class didn't exist before the Internet came into being because the costs of "
13205 "distributing porn were so high. Yet this new class of distributors got "
13206 "special attention in the Supreme Court, when the Court struck down the "
13207 "Communications Decency Act of 1996. It was partly because of the burden on "
13208 "noncommercial speakers that the statute was found to exceed Congress's "
13209 "power. The same point could have been made about noncommercial publishers "
13210 "after the advent of the Internet. The Eric Eldreds of the world before the "
13211 "Internet were extremely few. Yet one would think it at least as important to "
13212 "protect the Eldreds of the world as to protect noncommercial pornographers."
13215 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13216 #: freeculture.xml:10136
13218 "The Internet created the possibility of noncommercial publications of public "
13219 "domain works. Eldred's is just one example. There are literally thousands of "
13220 "others. Hundreds of thousands from across the world have discovered this "
13221 "platform of expression and now use it to share works that are, by law, free "
13222 "for the taking. This has produced what we might call the \"noncommercial "
13223 "publishing industry,\" which before the Internet was limited to people with "
13224 "large egos or with political or social causes. But with the Internet, it "
13225 "includes a wide range of individuals and groups dedicated to spreading "
13226 "culture generally.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
13229 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13230 #: freeculture.xml:10164
13232 "As I said, Eldred lives in New Hampshire. In 1998, Robert Frost's collection "
13233 "of poems <citetitle>New Hampshire</citetitle> was slated to pass into the "
13234 "public domain. Eldred wanted to post that collection in his free public "
13235 "library. But Congress got in the way. As I described in chapter 10, in "
13236 "1998, for the eleventh time in forty years, Congress extended the terms of "
13237 "existing copyrights—this time by twenty years. Eldred would not be "
13238 "free to add any works more recent than 1923 to his collection until 2019. "
13239 "Indeed, no copyrighted work would pass into the public domain until that "
13240 "year (and not even then, if Congress extends the term again). By contrast, "
13241 "in the same period, more than 1 million patents will pass into the public "
13246 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13247 #: freeculture.xml:10184
13249 "The full text is: \"Sonny [Bono] wanted the term of copyright protection to "
13250 "last forever. I am informed by staff that such a change would violate the "
13251 "Constitution. I invite all of you to work with me to strengthen our "
13252 "copyright laws in all of the ways available to us. As you know, there is "
13253 "also Jack Valenti's proposal for a term to last forever less one "
13254 "day. Perhaps the Committee may look at that next Congress,\" 144 "
13255 "Cong. Rec. H9946, 9951-2 (October 7, 1998)."
13258 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13259 #: freeculture.xml:10179
13261 "This was the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA), enacted in "
13262 "memory of the congressman and former musician Sonny Bono, who, his widow, "
13263 "Mary Bono, says, believed that \"copyrights should be forever.\"<placeholder "
13264 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
13267 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13268 #: freeculture.xml:10195
13270 "Eldred decided to fight this law. He first resolved to fight it through "
13271 "civil disobedience. In a series of interviews, Eldred announced that he "
13272 "would publish as planned, CTEA notwithstanding. But because of a second law "
13273 "passed in 1998, the NET (No Electronic Theft) Act, his act of publishing "
13274 "would make Eldred a felon—whether or not anyone complained. This was a "
13275 "dangerous strategy for a disabled programmer to undertake."
13278 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13279 #: freeculture.xml:10204
13281 "It was here that I became involved in Eldred's battle. I was a "
13282 "constitutional scholar whose first passion was constitutional "
13283 "interpretation. And though constitutional law courses never focus upon the "
13284 "Progress Clause of the Constitution, it had always struck me as importantly "
13285 "different. As you know, the Constitution says,"
13288 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
13289 #: freeculture.xml:10215
13291 "Congress has the power to promote the Progress of Science . . . by securing "
13292 "for limited Times to Authors . . . exclusive Right to their "
13293 ". . . Writings. . . ."
13296 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13297 #: freeculture.xml:10221
13299 "As I've described, this clause is unique within the power-granting clause of "
13300 "Article I, section 8 of our Constitution. Every other clause granting power "
13301 "to Congress simply says Congress has the power to do something—for "
13302 "example, to regulate \"commerce among the several states\" or \"declare "
13303 "War.\" But here, the \"something\" is something quite specific—to "
13304 "\"promote . . . Progress\"—through means that are also specific— "
13305 "by \"securing\" \"exclusive Rights\" (i.e., copyrights) \"for limited "
13309 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
13310 #: freeculture.xml:10240 freeculture.xml:11683
13311 msgid "Jaszi, Peter"
13314 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13315 #: freeculture.xml:10231
13317 "In the past forty years, Congress has gotten into the practice of extending "
13318 "existing terms of copyright protection. What puzzled me about this was, if "
13319 "Congress has the power to extend existing terms, then the Constitution's "
13320 "requirement that terms be \"limited\" will have no practical effect. If "
13321 "every time a copyright is about to expire, Congress has the power to extend "
13322 "its term, then Congress can achieve what the Constitution plainly "
13323 "forbids—perpetual terms \"on the installment plan,\" as Professor "
13324 "Peter Jaszi so nicely put it. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
13327 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13328 #: freeculture.xml:10243
13330 "As an academic, my first response was to hit the books. I remember sitting "
13331 "late at the office, scouring on-line databases for any serious consideration "
13332 "of the question. No one had ever challenged Congress's practice of extending "
13333 "existing terms. That failure may in part be why Congress seemed so "
13334 "untroubled in its habit. That, and the fact that the practice had become so "
13335 "lucrative for Congress. Congress knows that copyright owners will be willing "
13336 "to pay a great deal of money to see their copyright terms extended. And so "
13337 "Congress is quite happy to keep this gravy train going."
13340 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13341 #: freeculture.xml:10254
13343 "For this is the core of the corruption in our present system of "
13344 "government. \"Corruption\" not in the sense that representatives are "
13345 "bribed. Rather, \"corruption\" in the sense that the system induces the "
13346 "beneficiaries of Congress's acts to raise and give money to Congress to "
13347 "induce it to act. There's only so much time; there's only so much Congress "
13348 "can do. Why not limit its actions to those things it must do—and those "
13349 "things that pay? Extending copyright terms pays."
13352 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13353 #: freeculture.xml:10263
13355 "If that's not obvious to you, consider the following: Say you're one of the "
13356 "very few lucky copyright owners whose copyright continues to make money one "
13357 "hundred years after it was created. The Estate of Robert Frost is a good "
13358 "example. Frost died in 1963. His poetry continues to be extraordinarily "
13359 "valuable. Thus the Robert Frost estate benefits greatly from any extension "
13360 "of copyright, since no publisher would pay the estate any money if the poems "
13361 "Frost wrote could be published by anyone for free."
13364 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13365 #: freeculture.xml:10273
13367 "So imagine the Robert Frost estate is earning $100,000 a year from three of "
13368 "Frost's poems. And imagine the copyright for those poems is about to "
13369 "expire. You sit on the board of the Robert Frost estate. Your financial "
13370 "adviser comes to your board meeting with a very grim report:"
13374 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13375 #: freeculture.xml:10280
13377 "\"Next year,\" the adviser announces, \"our copyrights in works A, B, and C "
13378 "will expire. That means that after next year, we will no longer be receiving "
13379 "the annual royalty check of $100,000 from the publishers of those works."
13382 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13383 #: freeculture.xml:10288
13385 "\"There's a proposal in Congress, however,\" she continues, \"that could "
13386 "change this. A few congressmen are floating a bill to extend the terms of "
13387 "copyright by twenty years. That bill would be extraordinarily valuable to "
13388 "us. So we should hope this bill passes.\""
13391 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13392 #: freeculture.xml:10294
13394 "\"Hope?\" a fellow board member says. \"Can't we be doing something about "
13398 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13399 #: freeculture.xml:10298
13401 "\"Well, obviously, yes,\" the adviser responds. \"We could contribute to the "
13402 "campaigns of a number of representatives to try to assure that they support "
13406 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13407 #: freeculture.xml:10303
13409 "You hate politics. You hate contributing to campaigns. So you want to know "
13410 "whether this disgusting practice is worth it. \"How much would we get if "
13411 "this extension were passed?\" you ask the adviser. \"How much is it worth?\""
13414 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13415 #: freeculture.xml:10309
13417 "\"Well,\" the adviser says, \"if you're confident that you will continue to "
13418 "get at least $100,000 a year from these copyrights, and you use the "
13419 "`discount rate' that we use to evaluate estate investments (6 percent), then "
13420 "this law would be worth $1,146,000 to the estate.\""
13423 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13424 #: freeculture.xml:10315
13426 "You're a bit shocked by the number, but you quickly come to the correct "
13430 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13431 #: freeculture.xml:10319
13433 "\"So you're saying it would be worth it for us to pay more than $1,000,000 "
13434 "in campaign contributions if we were confident those contributions would "
13435 "assure that the bill was passed?\""
13438 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13439 #: freeculture.xml:10325
13441 "\"Absolutely,\" the adviser responds. \"It is worth it to you to contribute "
13442 "up to the `present value' of the income you expect from these "
13443 "copyrights. Which for us means over $1,000,000.\""
13447 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13448 #: freeculture.xml:10331
13450 "You quickly get the point—you as the member of the board and, I trust, "
13451 "you the reader. Each time copyrights are about to expire, every beneficiary "
13452 "in the position of the Robert Frost estate faces the same choice: If they "
13453 "can contribute to get a law passed to extend copyrights, they will benefit "
13454 "greatly from that extension. And so each time copyrights are about to "
13455 "expire, there is a massive amount of lobbying to get the copyright term "
13459 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13460 #: freeculture.xml:10342
13462 "Thus a congressional perpetual motion machine: So long as legislation can be "
13463 "bought (albeit indirectly), there will be all the incentive in the world to "
13464 "buy further extensions of copyright."
13468 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13469 #: freeculture.xml:10354
13471 "Associated Press, \"Disney Lobbying for Copyright Extension No Mickey Mouse "
13472 "Effort; Congress OKs Bill Granting Creators 20 More Years,\" "
13473 "<citetitle>Chicago Tribune</citetitle>, 17 October 1998, 22."
13477 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13478 #: freeculture.xml:10361
13480 "See Nick Brown, \"Fair Use No More?: Copyright in the Information Age,\" "
13481 "available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #49</ulink>."
13485 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13486 #: freeculture.xml:10369
13488 "Alan K. Ota, \"Disney in Washington: The Mouse That Roars,\" "
13489 "<citetitle>Congressional Quarterly This Week</citetitle>, 8 August 1990, "
13490 "available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #50</ulink>."
13493 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13494 #: freeculture.xml:10347
13496 "In the lobbying that led to the passage of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term "
13497 "Extension Act, this \"theory\" about incentives was proved real. Ten of the "
13498 "thirteen original sponsors of the act in the House received the maximum "
13499 "contribution from Disney's political action committee; in the Senate, eight "
13500 "of the twelve sponsors received contributions.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
13501 "id=\"0\"/> The RIAA and the MPAA are estimated to have spent over $1.5 "
13502 "million lobbying in the 1998 election cycle. They paid out more than "
13503 "$200,000 in campaign contributions.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> "
13504 "Disney is estimated to have contributed more than $800,000 to reelection "
13505 "campaigns in the cycle.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"2\"/>"
13508 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13509 #: freeculture.xml:10376
13511 "Constitutional law is not oblivious to the obvious. Or at least, it need not "
13512 "be. So when I was considering Eldred's complaint, this reality about the "
13513 "never-ending incentives to increase the copyright term was central to my "
13514 "thinking. In my view, a pragmatic court committed to interpreting and "
13515 "applying the Constitution of our framers would see that if Congress has the "
13516 "power to extend existing terms, then there would be no effective "
13517 "constitutional requirement that terms be \"limited.\" If they could extend "
13518 "it once, they would extend it again and again and again."
13522 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13523 #: freeculture.xml:10389
13525 "It was also my judgment that <emphasis>this</emphasis> Supreme Court would "
13526 "not allow Congress to extend existing terms. As anyone close to the Supreme "
13527 "Court's work knows, this Court has increasingly restricted the power of "
13528 "Congress when it has viewed Congress's actions as exceeding the power "
13529 "granted to it by the Constitution. Among constitutional scholars, the most "
13530 "famous example of this trend was the Supreme Court's decision in 1995 to "
13531 "strike down a law that banned the possession of guns near schools."
13534 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13535 #: freeculture.xml:10402
13537 "Since 1937, the Supreme Court had interpreted Congress's granted powers very "
13538 "broadly; so, while the Constitution grants Congress the power to regulate "
13539 "only \"commerce among the several states\" (aka \"interstate commerce\"), "
13540 "the Supreme Court had interpreted that power to include the power to "
13541 "regulate any activity that merely affected interstate commerce."
13544 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13545 #: freeculture.xml:10412
13547 "As the economy grew, this standard increasingly meant that there was no "
13548 "limit to Congress's power to regulate, since just about every activity, when "
13549 "considered on a national scale, affects interstate commerce. A Constitution "
13550 "designed to limit Congress's power was instead interpreted to impose no "
13554 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13555 #: freeculture.xml:10419
13557 "The Supreme Court, under Chief Justice Rehnquist's command, changed that in "
13558 "<citetitle>United States</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Lopez</citetitle>. The "
13559 "government had argued that possessing guns near schools affected interstate "
13560 "commerce. Guns near schools increase crime, crime lowers property values, "
13561 "and so on. In the oral argument, the Chief Justice asked the government "
13562 "whether there was any activity that would not affect interstate commerce "
13563 "under the reasoning the government advanced. The government said there was "
13564 "not; if Congress says an activity affects interstate commerce, then that "
13565 "activity affects interstate commerce. The Supreme Court, the government "
13566 "said, was not in the position to second-guess Congress."
13570 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13571 #: freeculture.xml:10434
13573 "<citetitle>United States</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Lopez</citetitle>, 514 "
13574 "U.S. 549, 564 (1995)."
13578 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13579 #: freeculture.xml:10441
13581 "<citetitle>United States</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Morrison</citetitle>, 529 "
13585 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13586 #: freeculture.xml:10432
13588 "\"We pause to consider the implications of the government's arguments,\" the "
13589 "Chief Justice wrote.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> If anything "
13590 "Congress says is interstate commerce must therefore be considered interstate "
13591 "commerce, then there would be no limit to Congress's power. The decision in "
13592 "<citetitle>Lopez</citetitle> was reaffirmed five years later in "
13593 "<citetitle>United States</citetitle> "
13594 "v. <citetitle>Morrison</citetitle>.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/>"
13598 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13599 #: freeculture.xml:10448
13601 "If it is a principle about enumerated powers, then the principle carries "
13602 "from one enumerated power to another. The animating point in the context of "
13603 "the Commerce Clause was that the interpretation offered by the government "
13604 "would allow the government unending power to regulate commerce—the "
13605 "limitation to interstate commerce notwithstanding. The same point is true in "
13606 "the context of the Copyright Clause. Here, too, the government's "
13607 "interpretation would allow the government unending power to regulate "
13608 "copyrights—the limitation to \"limited times\" notwithstanding."
13612 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13613 #: freeculture.xml:10445
13615 "If a principle were at work here, then it should apply to the Progress "
13616 "Clause as much as the Commerce Clause.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
13617 "id=\"0\"/> And if it is applied to the Progress Clause, the principle should "
13618 "yield the conclusion that Congress can't extend an existing term. If "
13619 "Congress could extend an existing term, then there would be no \"stopping "
13620 "point\" to Congress's power over terms, though the Constitution expressly "
13621 "states that there is such a limit. Thus, the same principle applied to the "
13622 "power to grant copyrights should entail that Congress is not allowed to "
13623 "extend the term of existing copyrights."
13626 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13627 #: freeculture.xml:10469
13629 "<emphasis>If</emphasis>, that is, the principle announced in "
13630 "<citetitle>Lopez</citetitle> stood for a principle. Many believed the "
13631 "decision in <citetitle>Lopez</citetitle> stood for politics—a "
13632 "conservative Supreme Court, which believed in states' rights, using its "
13633 "power over Congress to advance its own personal political preferences. But I "
13634 "rejected that view of the Supreme Court's decision. Indeed, shortly after "
13635 "the decision, I wrote an article demonstrating the \"fidelity\" in such an "
13636 "interpretation of the Constitution. The idea that the Supreme Court decides "
13637 "cases based upon its politics struck me as extraordinarily boring. I was "
13638 "not going to devote my life to teaching constitutional law if these nine "
13639 "Justices were going to be petty politicians."
13642 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13643 #: freeculture.xml:10482
13645 "Now let's pause for a moment to make sure we understand what the argument in "
13646 "<citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> was not about. By insisting on the "
13647 "Constitution's limits to copyright, obviously Eldred was not endorsing "
13648 "piracy. Indeed, in an obvious sense, he was fighting a kind of "
13649 "piracy—piracy of the public domain. When Robert Frost wrote his work "
13650 "and when Walt Disney created Mickey Mouse, the maximum copyright term was "
13651 "just fifty-six years. Because of interim changes, Frost and Disney had "
13652 "already enjoyed a seventy-five-year monopoly for their work. They had gotten "
13653 "the benefit of the bargain that the Constitution envisions: In exchange for "
13654 "a monopoly protected for fifty-six years, they created new work. But now "
13655 "these entities were using their power—expressed through the power of "
13656 "lobbyists' money—to get another twenty-year dollop of monopoly. That "
13657 "twenty-year dollop would be taken from the public domain. Eric Eldred was "
13658 "fighting a piracy that affects us all."
13662 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13663 #: freeculture.xml:10505
13665 "Brief of the Nashville Songwriters Association, "
13666 "<citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> v. <citetitle>Ashcroft</citetitle>, 537 U.S. "
13667 "186 (2003) (No. 01-618), n.10, available at <ulink "
13668 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #51</ulink>."
13671 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13672 #: freeculture.xml:10499
13674 "Some people view the public domain with contempt. In their brief before the "
13675 "Supreme Court, the Nashville Songwriters Association wrote that the public "
13676 "domain is nothing more than \"legal piracy.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
13677 "id=\"0\"/> But it is not piracy when the law allows it; and in our "
13678 "constitutional system, our law requires it. Some may not like the "
13679 "Constitution's requirements, but that doesn't make the Constitution a "
13680 "pirate's charter."
13683 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13684 #: freeculture.xml:10515
13686 "As we've seen, our constitutional system requires limits on copyright as a "
13687 "way to assure that copyright holders do not too heavily influence the "
13688 "development and distribution of our culture. Yet, as Eric Eldred discovered, "
13689 "we have set up a system that assures that copyright terms will be repeatedly "
13690 "extended, and extended, and extended. We have created the perfect storm for "
13691 "the public domain. Copyrights have not expired, and will not expire, so long "
13692 "as Congress is free to be bought to extend them again."
13695 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13696 #: freeculture.xml:10527
13698 "It is valuable copyrights that are responsible for terms being extended. "
13699 "Mickey Mouse and \"Rhapsody in Blue.\" These works are too valuable for "
13700 "copyright owners to ignore. But the real harm to our society from copyright "
13701 "extensions is not that Mickey Mouse remains Disney's. Forget Mickey "
13702 "Mouse. Forget Robert Frost. Forget all the works from the 1920s and 1930s "
13703 "that have continuing commercial value. The real harm of term extension comes "
13704 "not from these famous works. The real harm is to the works that are not "
13705 "famous, not commercially exploited, and no longer available as a result."
13709 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13710 #: freeculture.xml:10548
13712 "The figure of 2 percent is an extrapolation from the study by the "
13713 "Congressional Research Service, in light of the estimated renewal "
13714 "ranges. See Brief of Petitioners, <citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> "
13715 "v. <citetitle>Ashcroft</citetitle>, 7, available at <ulink "
13716 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #52</ulink>."
13719 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13720 #: freeculture.xml:10542
13722 "If you look at the work created in the first twenty years (1923 to 1942) "
13723 "affected by the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, 2 percent of that "
13724 "work has any continuing commercial value. It was the copyright holders for "
13725 "that 2 percent who pushed the CTEA through. But the law and its effect were "
13726 "not limited to that 2 percent. The law extended the terms of copyright "
13727 "generally.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
13731 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13732 #: freeculture.xml:10557
13734 "Think practically about the consequence of this extension—practically, "
13735 "as a businessperson, and not as a lawyer eager for more legal work. In 1930, "
13736 "10,047 books were published. In 2000, 174 of those books were still in "
13737 "print. Let's say you were Brewster Kahle, and you wanted to make available "
13738 "to the world in your iArchive project the remaining 9,873. What would you "
13742 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13743 #: freeculture.xml:10569
13745 "Well, first, you'd have to determine which of the 9,873 books were still "
13746 "under copyright. That requires going to a library (these data are not "
13747 "on-line) and paging through tomes of books, cross-checking the titles and "
13748 "authors of the 9,873 books with the copyright registration and renewal "
13749 "records for works published in 1930. That will produce a list of books still "
13753 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13754 #: freeculture.xml:10577
13756 "Then for the books still under copyright, you would need to locate the "
13757 "current copyright owners. How would you do that?"
13760 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13761 #: freeculture.xml:10581
13763 "Most people think that there must be a list of these copyright owners "
13764 "somewhere. Practical people think this way. How could there be thousands and "
13765 "thousands of government monopolies without there being at least a list?"
13768 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13769 #: freeculture.xml:10588
13771 "But there is no list. There may be a name from 1930, and then in 1959, of "
13772 "the person who registered the copyright. But just think practically about "
13773 "how impossibly difficult it would be to track down thousands of such "
13774 "records—especially since the person who registered is not necessarily "
13775 "the current owner. And we're just talking about 1930!"
13778 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13779 #: freeculture.xml:10597
13781 "\"But there isn't a list of who owns property generally,\" the apologists "
13782 "for the system respond. \"Why should there be a list of copyright owners?\""
13785 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13786 #: freeculture.xml:10602
13788 "Well, actually, if you think about it, there <emphasis>are</emphasis> plenty "
13789 "of lists of who owns what property. Think about deeds on houses, or titles "
13790 "to cars. And where there isn't a list, the code of real space is pretty "
13791 "good at suggesting who the owner of a bit of property is. (A swing set in "
13792 "your backyard is probably yours.) So formally or informally, we have a "
13793 "pretty good way to know who owns what tangible property."
13797 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13798 #: freeculture.xml:10611
13800 "So: You walk down a street and see a house. You can know who owns the house "
13801 "by looking it up in the courthouse registry. If you see a car, there is "
13802 "ordinarily a license plate that will link the owner to the car. If you see a "
13803 "bunch of children's toys sitting on the front lawn of a house, it's fairly "
13804 "easy to determine who owns the toys. And if you happen to see a baseball "
13805 "lying in a gutter on the side of the road, look around for a second for some "
13806 "kids playing ball. If you don't see any kids, then okay: Here's a bit of "
13807 "property whose owner we can't easily determine. It is the exception that "
13808 "proves the rule: that we ordinarily know quite well who owns what property."
13811 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13812 #: freeculture.xml:10626
13814 "Compare this story to intangible property. You go into a library. The "
13815 "library owns the books. But who owns the copyrights? As I've already "
13816 "described, there's no list of copyright owners. There are authors' names, of "
13817 "course, but their copyrights could have been assigned, or passed down in an "
13818 "estate like Grandma's old jewelry. To know who owns what, you would have to "
13819 "hire a private detective. The bottom line: The owner cannot easily be "
13820 "located. And in a regime like ours, in which it is a felony to use such "
13821 "property without the property owner's permission, the property isn't going "
13825 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13826 #: freeculture.xml:10638
13828 "The consequence with respect to old books is that they won't be digitized, "
13829 "and hence will simply rot away on shelves. But the consequence for other "
13830 "creative works is much more dire."
13833 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
13834 #: freeculture.xml:10643
13835 msgid "Agee, Michael"
13839 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13840 #: freeculture.xml:10656
13842 "See David G. Savage, \"High Court Scene of Showdown on Copyright Law,\" "
13843 "<citetitle>Los Angeles Times</citetitle>, 6 October 2002; David Streitfeld, "
13844 "\"Classic Movies, Songs, Books at Stake; Supreme Court Hears Arguments Today "
13845 "on Striking Down Copyright Extension,\" <citetitle>Orlando Sentinel "
13846 "Tribune</citetitle>, 9 October 2002."
13849 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
13850 #: freeculture.xml:10662
13851 msgid "Lucky Dog, The"
13854 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13855 #: freeculture.xml:10645
13857 "Consider the story of Michael Agee, chairman of Hal Roach Studios, which "
13858 "owns the copyrights for the Laurel and Hardy films. Agee is a direct "
13859 "beneficiary of the Bono Act. The Laurel and Hardy films were made between "
13860 "1921 and 1951. Only one of these films, <citetitle>The Lucky "
13861 "Dog</citetitle>, is currently out of copyright. But for the CTEA, films made "
13862 "after 1923 would have begun entering the public domain. Because Agee "
13863 "controls the exclusive rights for these popular films, he makes a great deal "
13864 "of money. According to one estimate, \"Roach has sold about 60,000 "
13865 "videocassettes and 50,000 DVDs of the duo's silent films.\"<placeholder "
13866 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
13869 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13870 #: freeculture.xml:10665
13872 "Yet Agee opposed the CTEA. His reasons demonstrate a rare virtue in this "
13873 "culture: selflessness. He argued in a brief before the Supreme Court that "
13874 "the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act will, if left standing, destroy "
13875 "a whole generation of American film."
13879 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13880 #: freeculture.xml:10671
13882 "His argument is straightforward. A tiny fraction of this work has any "
13883 "continuing commercial value. The rest—to the extent it survives at "
13884 "all—sits in vaults gathering dust. It may be that some of this work "
13885 "not now commercially valuable will be deemed to be valuable by the owners of "
13886 "the vaults. For this to occur, however, the commercial benefit from the work "
13887 "must exceed the costs of making the work available for distribution."
13891 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
13892 #: freeculture.xml:10689
13894 "Brief of Hal Roach Studios and Michael Agee as Amicus Curiae Supporting the "
13895 "Petitoners, <citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> "
13896 "v. <citetitle>Ashcroft</citetitle>, 537 U.S. 186 (2003) (No. 01- 618), "
13897 "12. See also Brief of Amicus Curiae filed on behalf of Petitioners by the "
13898 "Internet Archive, <citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> "
13899 "v. <citetitle>Ashcroft</citetitle>, available at <ulink "
13900 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #53</ulink>."
13903 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13904 #: freeculture.xml:10682
13906 "We can't know the benefits, but we do know a lot about the costs. For most "
13907 "of the history of film, the costs of restoring film were very high; digital "
13908 "technology has lowered these costs substantially. While it cost more than "
13909 "$10,000 to restore a ninety-minute black-and-white film in 1993, it can now "
13910 "cost as little as $100 to digitize one hour of mm film.<placeholder "
13911 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
13914 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13915 #: freeculture.xml:10699
13917 "Restoration technology is not the only cost, nor the most important. "
13918 "Lawyers, too, are a cost, and increasingly, a very important one. In "
13919 "addition to preserving the film, a distributor needs to secure the rights. "
13920 "And to secure the rights for a film that is under copyright, you need to "
13921 "locate the copyright owner."
13924 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13925 #: freeculture.xml:10707
13927 "Or more accurately, <emphasis>owners</emphasis>. As we've seen, there isn't "
13928 "only a single copyright associated with a film; there are many. There isn't "
13929 "a single person whom you can contact about those copyrights; there are as "
13930 "many as can hold the rights, which turns out to be an extremely large "
13931 "number. Thus the costs of clearing the rights to these films is "
13932 "exceptionally high."
13935 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13936 #: freeculture.xml:10715
13938 "\"But can't you just restore the film, distribute it, and then pay the "
13939 "copyright owner when she shows up?\" Sure, if you want to commit a "
13940 "felony. And even if you're not worried about committing a felony, when she "
13941 "does show up, she'll have the right to sue you for all the profits you have "
13942 "made. So, if you're successful, you can be fairly confident you'll be "
13943 "getting a call from someone's lawyer. And if you're not successful, you "
13944 "won't make enough to cover the costs of your own lawyer. Either way, you "
13945 "have to talk to a lawyer. And as is too often the case, saying you have to "
13946 "talk to a lawyer is the same as saying you won't make any money."
13950 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13951 #: freeculture.xml:10726
13953 "For some films, the benefit of releasing the film may well exceed these "
13954 "costs. But for the vast majority of them, there is no way the benefit would "
13955 "outweigh the legal costs. Thus, for the vast majority of old films, Agee "
13956 "argued, the film will not be restored and distributed until the copyright "
13960 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13961 #: freeculture.xml:10736
13963 "But by the time the copyright for these films expires, the film will have "
13964 "expired. These films were produced on nitrate-based stock, and nitrate stock "
13965 "dissolves over time. They will be gone, and the metal canisters in which "
13966 "they are now stored will be filled with nothing more than dust."
13969 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13970 #: freeculture.xml:10744
13972 "Of all the creative work produced by humans anywhere, a tiny fraction has "
13973 "continuing commercial value. For that tiny fraction, the copyright is a "
13974 "crucially important legal device. For that tiny fraction, the copyright "
13975 "creates incentives to produce and distribute the creative work. For that "
13976 "tiny fraction, the copyright acts as an \"engine of free expression.\""
13979 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13980 #: freeculture.xml:10753
13982 "But even for that tiny fraction, the actual time during which the creative "
13983 "work has a commercial life is extremely short. As I've indicated, most books "
13984 "go out of print within one year. The same is true of music and "
13985 "film. Commercial culture is sharklike. It must keep moving. And when a "
13986 "creative work falls out of favor with the commercial distributors, the "
13987 "commercial life ends."
13990 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
13991 #: freeculture.xml:10763
13993 "Yet that doesn't mean the life of the creative work ends. We don't keep "
13994 "libraries of books in order to compete with Barnes & Noble, and we don't "
13995 "have archives of films because we expect people to choose between spending "
13996 "Friday night watching new movies and spending Friday night watching a 1930 "
13997 "news documentary. The noncommercial life of culture is important and "
13998 "valuable—for entertainment but also, and more importantly, for "
13999 "knowledge. To understand who we are, and where we came from, and how we have "
14000 "made the mistakes that we have, we need to have access to this history."
14004 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14005 #: freeculture.xml:10776
14007 "Copyrights in this context do not drive an engine of free expression. In "
14008 "this context, there is no need for an exclusive right. Copyrights in this "
14009 "context do no good."
14012 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14013 #: freeculture.xml:10783
14015 "Yet, for most of our history, they also did little harm. For most of our "
14016 "history, when a work ended its commercial life, there was no "
14017 "<emphasis>copyright-related use</emphasis> that would be inhibited by an "
14018 "exclusive right. When a book went out of print, you could not buy it from a "
14019 "publisher. But you could still buy it from a used book store, and when a "
14020 "used book store sells it, in America, at least, there is no need to pay the "
14021 "copyright owner anything. Thus, the ordinary use of a book after its "
14022 "commercial life ended was a use that was independent of copyright law."
14025 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14026 #: freeculture.xml:10794
14028 "The same was effectively true of film. Because the costs of restoring a "
14029 "film—the real economic costs, not the lawyer costs—were so high, "
14030 "it was never at all feasible to preserve or restore film. Like the remains "
14031 "of a great dinner, when it's over, it's over. Once a film passed out of its "
14032 "commercial life, it may have been archived for a bit, but that was the end "
14033 "of its life so long as the market didn't have more to offer."
14036 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14037 #: freeculture.xml:10803
14039 "In other words, though copyright has been relatively short for most of our "
14040 "history, long copyrights wouldn't have mattered for the works that lost "
14041 "their commercial value. Long copyrights for these works would not have "
14042 "interfered with anything."
14045 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14046 #: freeculture.xml:10809
14047 msgid "But this situation has now changed."
14050 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14051 #: freeculture.xml:10812
14053 "One crucially important consequence of the emergence of digital technologies "
14054 "is to enable the archive that Brewster Kahle dreams of. Digital "
14055 "technologies now make it possible to preserve and give access to all sorts "
14056 "of knowledge. Once a book goes out of print, we can now imagine digitizing "
14057 "it and making it available to everyone, forever. Once a film goes out of "
14058 "distribution, we could digitize it and make it available to everyone, "
14059 "forever. Digital technologies give new life to copyrighted material after it "
14060 "passes out of its commercial life. It is now possible to preserve and assure "
14061 "universal access to this knowledge and culture, whereas before it was not."
14065 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14066 #: freeculture.xml:10825
14068 "And now copyright law does get in the way. Every step of producing this "
14069 "digital archive of our culture infringes on the exclusive right of "
14070 "copyright. To digitize a book is to copy it. To do that requires permission "
14071 "of the copyright owner. The same with music, film, or any other aspect of "
14072 "our culture protected by copyright. The effort to make these things "
14073 "available to history, or to researchers, or to those who just want to "
14074 "explore, is now inhibited by a set of rules that were written for a "
14075 "radically different context."
14078 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14079 #: freeculture.xml:10835
14081 "Here is the core of the harm that comes from extending terms: Now that "
14082 "technology enables us to rebuild the library of Alexandria, the law gets in "
14083 "the way. And it doesn't get in the way for any useful "
14084 "<emphasis>copyright</emphasis> purpose, for the purpose of copyright is to "
14085 "enable the commercial market that spreads culture. No, we are talking about "
14086 "culture after it has lived its commercial life. In this context, copyright "
14087 "is serving no purpose <emphasis>at all</emphasis> related to the spread of "
14088 "knowledge. In this context, copyright is not an engine of free "
14089 "expression. Copyright is a brake."
14092 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14093 #: freeculture.xml:10846
14095 "You may well ask, \"But if digital technologies lower the costs for Brewster "
14096 "Kahle, then they will lower the costs for Random House, too. So won't "
14097 "Random House do as well as Brewster Kahle in spreading culture widely?\""
14100 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14101 #: freeculture.xml:10852
14103 "Maybe. Someday. But there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that "
14104 "publishers would be as complete as libraries. If Barnes & Noble offered "
14105 "to lend books from its stores for a low price, would that eliminate the need "
14106 "for libraries? Only if you think that the only role of a library is to serve "
14107 "what \"the market\" would demand. But if you think the role of a library is "
14108 "bigger than this—if you think its role is to archive culture, whether "
14109 "there's a demand for any particular bit of that culture or not—then we "
14110 "can't count on the commercial market to do our library work for us."
14114 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
14115 #: freeculture.xml:10875
14117 "Jason Schultz, \"The Myth of the 1976 Copyright `Chaos' Theory,\" 20 "
14118 "December 2002, available at <ulink "
14119 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #54</ulink>."
14122 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14123 #: freeculture.xml:10863
14125 "I would be the first to agree that it should do as much as it can: We should "
14126 "rely upon the market as much as possible to spread and enable culture. My "
14127 "message is absolutely not antimarket. But where we see the market is not "
14128 "doing the job, then we should allow nonmarket forces the freedom to fill the "
14129 "gaps. As one researcher calculated for American culture, 94 percent of the "
14130 "films, books, and music produced between and 1946 is not commercially "
14131 "available. However much you love the commercial market, if access is a "
14132 "value, then 6 percent is a failure to provide that value.<placeholder "
14133 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
14136 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14137 #: freeculture.xml:10882
14139 "In January 1999, we filed a lawsuit on Eric Eldred's behalf in federal "
14140 "district court in Washington, D.C., asking the court to declare the Sonny "
14141 "Bono Copyright Term Extension Act unconstitutional. The two central claims "
14142 "that we made were (1) that extending existing terms violated the "
14143 "Constitution's \"limited Times\" requirement, and (2) that extending terms "
14144 "by another twenty years violated the First Amendment."
14147 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14148 #: freeculture.xml:10890
14150 "The district court dismissed our claims without even hearing an argument. A "
14151 "panel of the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit also dismissed our "
14152 "claims, though after hearing an extensive argument. But that decision at "
14153 "least had a dissent, by one of the most conservative judges on that "
14154 "court. That dissent gave our claims life."
14157 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14158 #: freeculture.xml:10897
14160 "Judge David Sentelle said the CTEA violated the requirement that copyrights "
14161 "be for \"limited Times\" only. His argument was as elegant as it was simple: "
14162 "If Congress can extend existing terms, then there is no \"stopping point\" "
14163 "to Congress's power under the Copyright Clause. The power to extend existing "
14164 "terms means Congress is not required to grant terms that are \"limited.\" "
14165 "Thus, Judge Sentelle argued, the court had to interpret the term \"limited "
14166 "Times\" to give it meaning. And the best interpretation, Judge Sentelle "
14167 "argued, would be to deny Congress the power to extend existing terms."
14170 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14171 #: freeculture.xml:10908
14173 "We asked the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit as a whole to hear the "
14174 "case. Cases are ordinarily heard in panels of three, except for important "
14175 "cases or cases that raise issues specific to the circuit as a whole, where "
14176 "the court will sit \"en banc\" to hear the case."
14180 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14181 #: freeculture.xml:10914
14183 "The Court of Appeals rejected our request to hear the case en banc. This "
14184 "time, Judge Sentelle was joined by the most liberal member of the "
14185 "D.C. Circuit, Judge David Tatel. Both the most conservative and the most "
14186 "liberal judges in the D.C. Circuit believed Congress had overstepped its "
14190 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14191 #: freeculture.xml:10923
14193 "It was here that most expected Eldred v. Ashcroft would die, for the Supreme "
14194 "Court rarely reviews any decision by a court of appeals. (It hears about one "
14195 "hundred cases a year, out of more than five thousand appeals.) And it "
14196 "practically never reviews a decision that upholds a statute when no other "
14197 "court has yet reviewed the statute."
14200 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14201 #: freeculture.xml:10930
14203 "But in February 2002, the Supreme Court surprised the world by granting our "
14204 "petition to review the D.C. Circuit opinion. Argument was set for October of "
14205 "2002. The summer would be spent writing briefs and preparing for argument."
14208 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14209 #: freeculture.xml:10936
14211 "It is over a year later as I write these words. It is still astonishingly "
14212 "hard. If you know anything at all about this story, you know that we lost "
14213 "the appeal. And if you know something more than just the minimum, you "
14214 "probably think there was no way this case could have been won. After our "
14215 "defeat, I received literally thousands of missives by well-wishers and "
14216 "supporters, thanking me for my work on behalf of this noble but doomed "
14217 "cause. And none from this pile was more significant to me than the e-mail "
14218 "from my client, Eric Eldred."
14221 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14222 #: freeculture.xml:10946
14224 "But my client and these friends were wrong. This case could have been "
14225 "won. It should have been won. And no matter how hard I try to retell this "
14226 "story to myself, I can never escape believing that my own mistake lost it."
14229 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
14230 #: freeculture.xml:10951 freeculture.xml:10965
14231 msgid "Steward, Geoffrey"
14235 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14236 #: freeculture.xml:10953
14238 "The mistake was made early, though it became obvious only at the very "
14239 "end. Our case had been supported from the very beginning by an extraordinary "
14240 "lawyer, Geoffrey Stewart, and by the law firm he had moved to, Jones, Day, "
14241 "Reavis and Pogue. Jones Day took a great deal of heat from its "
14242 "copyright-protectionist clients for supporting us. They ignored this "
14243 "pressure (something that few law firms today would ever do), and throughout "
14244 "the case, they gave it everything they could."
14247 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
14248 #: freeculture.xml:10963 freeculture.xml:11304 freeculture.xml:11319 freeculture.xml:11412 freeculture.xml:11626 freeculture.xml:11657 freeculture.xml:11745
14252 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
14253 #: freeculture.xml:10964
14254 msgid "Bromberg, Dan"
14257 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14258 #: freeculture.xml:10967
14260 "There were three key lawyers on the case from Jones Day. Geoff Stewart was "
14261 "the first, but then Dan Bromberg and Don Ayer became quite "
14262 "involved. Bromberg and Ayer in particular had a common view about how this "
14263 "case would be won: We would only win, they repeatedly told me, if we could "
14264 "make the issue seem \"important\" to the Supreme Court. It had to seem as if "
14265 "dramatic harm were being done to free speech and free culture; otherwise, "
14266 "they would never vote against \"the most powerful media companies in the "
14270 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14271 #: freeculture.xml:10977
14273 "I hate this view of the law. Of course I thought the Sonny Bono Act was a "
14274 "dramatic harm to free speech and free culture. Of course I still think it "
14275 "is. But the idea that the Supreme Court decides the law based on how "
14276 "important they believe the issues are is just wrong. It might be \"right\" "
14277 "as in \"true,\" I thought, but it is \"wrong\" as in \"it just shouldn't be "
14278 "that way.\" As I believed that any faithful interpretation of what the "
14279 "framers of our Constitution did would yield the conclusion that the CTEA was "
14280 "unconstitutional, and as I believed that any faithful interpretation of what "
14281 "the First Amendment means would yield the conclusion that the power to "
14282 "extend existing copyright terms is unconstitutional, I was not persuaded "
14283 "that we had to sell our case like soap. Just as a law that bans the "
14284 "swastika is unconstitutional not because the Court likes Nazis but because "
14285 "such a law would violate the Constitution, so too, in my view, would the "
14286 "Court decide whether Congress's law was constitutional based on the "
14287 "Constitution, not based on whether they liked the values that the framers "
14288 "put in the Constitution."
14291 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14292 #: freeculture.xml:10998
14294 "In any case, I thought, the Court must already see the danger and the harm "
14295 "caused by this sort of law. Why else would they grant review? There was no "
14296 "reason to hear the case in the Supreme Court if they weren't convinced that "
14297 "this regulation was harmful. So in my view, we didn't need to persuade them "
14298 "that this law was bad, we needed to show why it was unconstitutional."
14302 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14303 #: freeculture.xml:11006
14305 "There was one way, however, in which I felt politics would matter and in "
14306 "which I thought a response was appropriate. I was convinced that the Court "
14307 "would not hear our arguments if it thought these were just the arguments of "
14308 "a group of lefty loons. This Supreme Court was not about to launch into a "
14309 "new field of judicial review if it seemed that this field of review was "
14310 "simply the preference of a small political minority. Although my focus in "
14311 "the case was not to demonstrate how bad the Sonny Bono Act was but to "
14312 "demonstrate that it was unconstitutional, my hope was to make this argument "
14313 "against a background of briefs that covered the full range of political "
14314 "views. To show that this claim against the CTEA was grounded in "
14315 "<emphasis>law</emphasis> and not politics, then, we tried to gather the "
14316 "widest range of credible critics—credible not because they were rich "
14317 "and famous, but because they, in the aggregate, demonstrated that this law "
14318 "was unconstitutional regardless of one's politics."
14321 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
14322 #: freeculture.xml:11037 freeculture.xml:11061
14323 msgid "Eagle Forum"
14326 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
14327 #: freeculture.xml:11038
14328 msgid "Schlafly, Phyllis"
14331 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14332 #: freeculture.xml:11025
14334 "The first step happened all by itself. Phyllis Schlafly's organization, "
14335 "Eagle Forum, had been an opponent of the CTEA from the very beginning. "
14336 "Mrs. Schlafly viewed the CTEA as a sellout by Congress. In November 1998, "
14337 "she wrote a stinging editorial attacking the Republican Congress for "
14338 "allowing the law to pass. As she wrote, \"Do you sometimes wonder why bills "
14339 "that create a financial windfall to narrow special interests slide easily "
14340 "through the intricate legislative process, while bills that benefit the "
14341 "general public seem to get bogged down?\" The answer, as the editorial "
14342 "documented, was the power of money. Schlafly enumerated Disney's "
14343 "contributions to the key players on the committees. It was money, not "
14344 "justice, that gave Mickey Mouse twenty more years in Disney's control, "
14345 "Schlafly argued. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder "
14346 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
14349 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14350 #: freeculture.xml:11041
14352 "In the Court of Appeals, Eagle Forum was eager to file a brief supporting "
14353 "our position. Their brief made the argument that became the core claim in "
14354 "the Supreme Court: If Congress can extend the term of existing copyrights, "
14355 "there is no limit to Congress's power to set terms. That strong "
14356 "conservative argument persuaded a strong conservative judge, Judge Sentelle."
14359 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14360 #: freeculture.xml:11049
14362 "In the Supreme Court, the briefs on our side were about as diverse as it "
14363 "gets. They included an extraordinary historical brief by the Free Software "
14364 "Foundation (home of the GNU project that made GNU/ Linux possible). They "
14365 "included a powerful brief about the costs of uncertainty by Intel. There "
14366 "were two law professors' briefs, one by copyright scholars and one by First "
14367 "Amendment scholars. There was an exhaustive and uncontroverted brief by the "
14368 "world's experts in the history of the Progress Clause. And of course, there "
14369 "was a new brief by Eagle Forum, repeating and strengthening its arguments. "
14370 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
14374 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14375 #: freeculture.xml:11064
14377 "Those briefs framed a legal argument. Then to support the legal argument, "
14378 "there were a number of powerful briefs by libraries and archives, including "
14379 "the Internet Archive, the American Association of Law Libraries, and the "
14380 "National Writers Union."
14383 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14384 #: freeculture.xml:11070
14386 "But two briefs captured the policy argument best. One made the argument I've "
14387 "already described: A brief by Hal Roach Studios argued that unless the law "
14388 "was struck, a whole generation of American film would disappear. The other "
14389 "made the economic argument absolutely clear."
14392 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
14393 #: freeculture.xml:11076
14394 msgid "Akerlof, George"
14397 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
14398 #: freeculture.xml:11077
14399 msgid "Arrow, Kenneth"
14402 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
14403 #: freeculture.xml:11078
14404 msgid "Buchanan, James"
14407 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
14408 #: freeculture.xml:11079
14409 msgid "Coase, Ronald"
14412 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
14413 #: freeculture.xml:11080
14414 msgid "Friedman, Milton"
14417 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14418 #: freeculture.xml:11082
14420 "This economists' brief was signed by seventeen economists, including five "
14421 "Nobel Prize winners, including Ronald Coase, James Buchanan, Milton "
14422 "Friedman, Kenneth Arrow, and George Akerlof. The economists, as the list of "
14423 "Nobel winners demonstrates, spanned the political spectrum. Their "
14424 "conclusions were powerful: There was no plausible claim that extending the "
14425 "terms of existing copyrights would do anything to increase incentives to "
14426 "create. Such extensions were nothing more than \"rent-seeking\"—the "
14427 "fancy term economists use to describe special-interest legislation gone "
14431 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
14432 #: freeculture.xml:11105 freeculture.xml:11118 freeculture.xml:11310 freeculture.xml:11662
14433 msgid "Fried, Charles"
14436 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14437 #: freeculture.xml:11093
14439 "The same effort at balance was reflected in the legal team we gathered to "
14440 "write our briefs in the case. The Jones Day lawyers had been with us from "
14441 "the start. But when the case got to the Supreme Court, we added three "
14442 "lawyers to help us frame this argument to this Court: Alan Morrison, a "
14443 "lawyer from Public Citizen, a Washington group that had made constitutional "
14444 "history with a series of seminal victories in the Supreme Court defending "
14445 "individual rights; my colleague and dean, Kathleen Sullivan, who had argued "
14446 "many cases in the Court, and who had advised us early on about a First "
14447 "Amendment strategy; and finally, former solicitor general Charles Fried. "
14448 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
14451 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14452 #: freeculture.xml:11108
14454 "Fried was a special victory for our side. Every other former solicitor "
14455 "general was hired by the other side to defend Congress's power to give media "
14456 "companies the special favor of extended copyright terms. Fried was the only "
14457 "one who turned down that lucrative assignment to stand up for something he "
14458 "believed in. He had been Ronald Reagan's chief lawyer in the Supreme "
14459 "Court. He had helped craft the line of cases that limited Congress's power "
14460 "in the context of the Commerce Clause. And while he had argued many "
14461 "positions in the Supreme Court that I personally disagreed with, his joining "
14462 "the cause was a vote of confidence in our argument. <placeholder "
14463 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
14466 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14467 #: freeculture.xml:11121
14469 "The government, in defending the statute, had its collection of friends, as "
14470 "well. Significantly, however, none of these \"friends\" included historians "
14471 "or economists. The briefs on the other side of the case were written "
14472 "exclusively by major media companies, congressmen, and copyright holders."
14475 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14476 #: freeculture.xml:11128
14478 "The media companies were not surprising. They had the most to gain from the "
14479 "law. The congressmen were not surprising either—they were defending "
14480 "their power and, indirectly, the gravy train of contributions such power "
14481 "induced. And of course it was not surprising that the copyright holders "
14482 "would defend the idea that they should continue to have the right to control "
14483 "who did what with content they wanted to control."
14487 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
14488 #: freeculture.xml:11144
14490 "Brief of Amici Dr. Seuss Enterprise et al., <citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> "
14491 "v. <citetitle>Ashcroft</citetitle>, 537 U.S. (2003) (No. 01-618), 19."
14495 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
14496 #: freeculture.xml:11152
14498 "Dinitia Smith, \"Immortal Words, Immortal Royalties? Even Mickey Mouse Joins "
14499 "the Fray,\" <citetitle>New York Times</citetitle>, 28 March 1998, B7."
14502 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
14503 #: freeculture.xml:11159
14504 msgid "Gershwin, George"
14507 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14508 #: freeculture.xml:11137
14510 "Dr. Seuss's representatives, for example, argued that it was better for the "
14511 "Dr. Seuss estate to control what happened to Dr. Seuss's work— better "
14512 "than allowing it to fall into the public domain—because if this "
14513 "creativity were in the public domain, then people could use it to \"glorify "
14514 "drugs or to create pornography.\"<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> "
14515 "That was also the motive of the Gershwin estate, which defended its "
14516 "\"protection\" of the work of George Gershwin. They refuse, for example, to "
14517 "license <citetitle>Porgy and Bess</citetitle> to anyone who refuses to use "
14518 "African Americans in the cast.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> "
14519 "That's their view of how this part of American culture should be controlled, "
14520 "and they wanted this law to help them effect that control. <placeholder "
14521 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"2\"/>"
14524 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14525 #: freeculture.xml:11162
14527 "This argument made clear a theme that is rarely noticed in this debate. "
14528 "When Congress decides to extend the term of existing copyrights, Congress is "
14529 "making a choice about which speakers it will favor. Famous and beloved "
14530 "copyright owners, such as the Gershwin estate and Dr. Seuss, come to "
14531 "Congress and say, \"Give us twenty years to control the speech about these "
14532 "icons of American culture. We'll do better with them than anyone else.\" "
14533 "Congress of course likes to reward the popular and famous by giving them "
14534 "what they want. But when Congress gives people an exclusive right to speak "
14535 "in a certain way, that's just what the First Amendment is traditionally "
14539 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14540 #: freeculture.xml:11174
14542 "We argued as much in a final brief. Not only would upholding the CTEA mean "
14543 "that there was no limit to the power of Congress to extend "
14544 "copyrights—extensions that would further concentrate the market; it "
14545 "would also mean that there was no limit to Congress's power to play "
14546 "favorites, through copyright, with who has the right to speak. Between "
14547 "February and October, there was little I did beyond preparing for this "
14548 "case. Early on, as I said, I set the strategy."
14551 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14552 #: freeculture.xml:11183
14554 "The Supreme Court was divided into two important camps. One camp we called "
14555 "\"the Conservatives.\" The other we called \"the Rest.\" The Conservatives "
14556 "included Chief Justice Rehnquist, Justice O'Connor, Justice Scalia, Justice "
14557 "Kennedy, and Justice Thomas. These five had been the most consistent in "
14558 "limiting Congress's power. They were the five who had supported the "
14559 "<citetitle>Lopez/Morrison</citetitle> line of cases that said that an "
14560 "enumerated power had to be interpreted to assure that Congress's powers had "
14564 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
14565 #: freeculture.xml:11192 freeculture.xml:11216 freeculture.xml:11555 freeculture.xml:11567
14566 msgid "Breyer, Stephen"
14570 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14571 #: freeculture.xml:11194
14573 "The Rest were the four Justices who had strongly opposed limits on "
14574 "Congress's power. These four—Justice Stevens, Justice Souter, Justice "
14575 "Ginsburg, and Justice Breyer—had repeatedly argued that the "
14576 "Constitution gives Congress broad discretion to decide how best to implement "
14577 "its powers. In case after case, these justices had argued that the Court's "
14578 "role should be one of deference. Though the votes of these four justices "
14579 "were the votes that I personally had most consistently agreed with, they "
14580 "were also the votes that we were least likely to get."
14583 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14584 #: freeculture.xml:11206
14586 "In particular, the least likely was Justice Ginsburg's. In addition to her "
14587 "general view about deference to Congress (except where issues of gender are "
14588 "involved), she had been particularly deferential in the context of "
14589 "intellectual property protections. She and her daughter (an excellent and "
14590 "well-known intellectual property scholar) were cut from the same "
14591 "intellectual property cloth. We expected she would agree with the writings "
14592 "of her daughter: that Congress had the power in this context to do as it "
14593 "wished, even if what Congress wished made little sense."
14596 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14597 #: freeculture.xml:11218
14599 "Close behind Justice Ginsburg were two justices whom we also viewed as "
14600 "unlikely allies, though possible surprises. Justice Souter strongly favored "
14601 "deference to Congress, as did Justice Breyer. But both were also very "
14602 "sensitive to free speech concerns. And as we strongly believed, there was a "
14603 "very important free speech argument against these retrospective extensions."
14606 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14607 #: freeculture.xml:11226
14609 "The only vote we could be confident about was that of Justice "
14610 "Stevens. History will record Justice Stevens as one of the greatest judges "
14611 "on this Court. His votes are consistently eclectic, which just means that no "
14612 "simple ideology explains where he will stand. But he had consistently argued "
14613 "for limits in the context of intellectual property generally. We were fairly "
14614 "confident he would recognize limits here."
14617 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14618 #: freeculture.xml:11234
14620 "This analysis of \"the Rest\" showed most clearly where our focus had to be: "
14621 "on the Conservatives. To win this case, we had to crack open these five and "
14622 "get at least a majority to go our way. Thus, the single overriding argument "
14623 "that animated our claim rested on the Conservatives' most important "
14624 "jurisprudential innovation—the argument that Judge Sentelle had relied "
14625 "upon in the Court of Appeals, that Congress's power must be interpreted so "
14626 "that its enumerated powers have limits."
14630 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14631 #: freeculture.xml:11244
14633 "This then was the core of our strategy—a strategy for which I am "
14634 "responsible. We would get the Court to see that just as with the "
14635 "<citetitle>Lopez</citetitle> case, under the government's argument here, "
14636 "Congress would always have unlimited power to extend existing terms. If "
14637 "anything was plain about Congress's power under the Progress Clause, it was "
14638 "that this power was supposed to be \"limited.\" Our aim would be to get the "
14639 "Court to reconcile <citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> with "
14640 "<citetitle>Lopez</citetitle>: If Congress's power to regulate commerce was "
14641 "limited, then so, too, must Congress's power to regulate copyright be "
14645 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14646 #: freeculture.xml:11258
14648 "The argument on the government's side came down to this: Congress has done "
14649 "it before. It should be allowed to do it again. The government claimed that "
14650 "from the very beginning, Congress has been extending the term of existing "
14651 "copyrights. So, the government argued, the Court should not now say that "
14652 "practice is unconstitutional."
14655 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14656 #: freeculture.xml:11265
14658 "There was some truth to the government's claim, but not much. We certainly "
14659 "agreed that Congress had extended existing terms in and in 1909. And of "
14660 "course, in 1962, Congress began extending existing terms "
14661 "regularly—eleven times in forty years."
14665 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14666 #: freeculture.xml:11272
14668 "But this \"consistency\" should be kept in perspective. Congress extended "
14669 "existing terms once in the first hundred years of the Republic. It then "
14670 "extended existing terms once again in the next fifty. Those rare extensions "
14671 "are in contrast to the now regular practice of extending existing "
14672 "terms. Whatever restraint Congress had had in the past, that restraint was "
14673 "now gone. Congress was now in a cycle of extensions; there was no reason to "
14674 "expect that cycle would end. This Court had not hesitated to intervene where "
14675 "Congress was in a similar cycle of extension. There was no reason it "
14676 "couldn't intervene here. Oral argument was scheduled for the first week in "
14677 "October. I arrived in D.C. two weeks before the argument. During those two "
14678 "weeks, I was repeatedly \"mooted\" by lawyers who had volunteered to help in "
14679 "the case. Such \"moots\" are basically practice rounds, where wannabe "
14680 "justices fire questions at wannabe winners."
14683 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14684 #: freeculture.xml:11295
14686 "I was convinced that to win, I had to keep the Court focused on a single "
14687 "point: that if this extension is permitted, then there is no limit to the "
14688 "power to set terms. Going with the government would mean that terms would be "
14689 "effectively unlimited; going with us would give Congress a clear line to "
14690 "follow: Don't extend existing terms. The moots were an effective practice; I "
14691 "found ways to take every question back to this central idea."
14694 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14695 #: freeculture.xml:11306
14697 "One moot was before the lawyers at Jones Day. Don Ayer was the skeptic. He "
14698 "had served in the Reagan Justice Department with Solicitor General Charles "
14699 "Fried. He had argued many cases before the Supreme Court. And in his review "
14700 "of the moot, he let his concern speak: <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
14704 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14705 #: freeculture.xml:11313
14707 "\"I'm just afraid that unless they really see the harm, they won't be "
14708 "willing to upset this practice that the government says has been a "
14709 "consistent practice for two hundred years. You have to make them see the "
14710 "harm—passionately get them to see the harm. For if they don't see "
14711 "that, then we haven't any chance of winning.\""
14715 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14716 #: freeculture.xml:11321
14718 "He may have argued many cases before this Court, I thought, but he didn't "
14719 "understand its soul. As a clerk, I had seen the Justices do the right "
14720 "thing—not because of politics but because it was right. As a law "
14721 "professor, I had spent my life teaching my students that this Court does the "
14722 "right thing—not because of politics but because it is right. As I "
14723 "listened to Ayer's plea for passion in pressing politics, I understood his "
14724 "point, and I rejected it. Our argument was right. That was enough. Let the "
14725 "politicians learn to see that it was also good. The night before the "
14726 "argument, a line of people began to form in front of the Supreme Court. The "
14727 "case had become a focus of the press and of the movement to free "
14728 "culture. Hundreds stood in line for the chance to see the "
14729 "proceedings. Scores spent the night on the Supreme Court steps so that they "
14730 "would be assured a seat."
14733 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14734 #: freeculture.xml:11338
14736 "Not everyone has to wait in line. People who know the Justices can ask for "
14737 "seats they control. (I asked Justice Scalia's chambers for seats for my "
14738 "parents, for example.) Members of the Supreme Court bar can get a seat in a "
14739 "special section reserved for them. And senators and congressmen have a "
14740 "special place where they get to sit, too. And finally, of course, the press "
14741 "has a gallery, as do clerks working for the Justices on the Court. As we "
14742 "entered that morning, there was no place that was not taken. This was an "
14743 "argument about intellectual property law, yet the halls were filled. As I "
14744 "walked in to take my seat at the front of the Court, I saw my parents "
14745 "sitting on the left. As I sat down at the table, I saw Jack Valenti sitting "
14746 "in the special section ordinarily reserved for family of the Justices."
14749 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14750 #: freeculture.xml:11353
14752 "When the Chief Justice called me to begin my argument, I began where I "
14753 "intended to stay: on the question of the limits on Congress's power. This "
14754 "was a case about enumerated powers, I said, and whether those enumerated "
14755 "powers had any limit."
14758 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14759 #: freeculture.xml:11359
14761 "Justice O'Connor stopped me within one minute of my opening. The history "
14762 "was bothering her."
14765 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
14766 #: freeculture.xml:11364
14768 "justice o'connor: Congress has extended the term so often through the years, "
14769 "and if you are right, don't we run the risk of upsetting previous extensions "
14770 "of time? I mean, this seems to be a practice that began with the very first "
14774 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14775 #: freeculture.xml:11371
14777 "She was quite willing to concede \"that this flies directly in the face of "
14778 "what the framers had in mind.\" But my response again and again was to "
14779 "emphasize limits on Congress's power."
14783 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
14784 #: freeculture.xml:11377
14786 "mr. lessig: Well, if it flies in the face of what the framers had in mind, "
14787 "then the question is, is there a way of interpreting their words that gives "
14788 "effect to what they had in mind, and the answer is yes."
14791 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14792 #: freeculture.xml:11385
14794 "There were two points in this argument when I should have seen where the "
14795 "Court was going. The first was a question by Justice Kennedy, who observed,"
14798 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
14799 #: freeculture.xml:11391
14801 "justice kennedy: Well, I suppose implicit in the argument that the '76 act, "
14802 "too, should have been declared void, and that we might leave it alone "
14803 "because of the disruption, is that for all these years the act has impeded "
14804 "progress in science and the useful arts. I just don't see any empirical "
14805 "evidence for that."
14808 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14809 #: freeculture.xml:11399
14811 "Here follows my clear mistake. Like a professor correcting a student, I "
14815 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
14816 #: freeculture.xml:11405
14818 "mr. lessig: Justice, we are not making an empirical claim at all. Nothing "
14819 "in our Copyright Clause claim hangs upon the empirical assertion about "
14820 "impeding progress. Our only argument is this is a structural limit necessary "
14821 "to assure that what would be an effectively perpetual term not be permitted "
14822 "under the copyright laws."
14825 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14826 #: freeculture.xml:11414
14828 "That was a correct answer, but it wasn't the right answer. The right answer "
14829 "was instead that there was an obvious and profound harm. Any number of "
14830 "briefs had been written about it. He wanted to hear it. And here was the "
14831 "place Don Ayer's advice should have mattered. This was a softball; my answer "
14832 "was a swing and a miss."
14835 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14836 #: freeculture.xml:11421
14838 "The second came from the Chief, for whom the whole case had been "
14839 "crafted. For the Chief Justice had crafted the <citetitle>Lopez</citetitle> "
14840 "ruling, and we hoped that he would see this case as its second cousin."
14844 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14845 #: freeculture.xml:11426
14847 "It was clear a second into his question that he wasn't at all sympathetic. "
14848 "To him, we were a bunch of anarchists. As he asked:"
14851 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
14852 #: freeculture.xml:11433
14854 "chief justice: Well, but you want more than that. You want the right to copy "
14855 "verbatim other people's books, don't you?"
14858 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
14859 #: freeculture.xml:11437
14861 "mr. lessig: We want the right to copy verbatim works that should be in the "
14862 "public domain and would be in the public domain but for a statute that "
14863 "cannot be justified under ordinary First Amendment analysis or under a "
14864 "proper reading of the limits built into the Copyright Clause."
14867 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14868 #: freeculture.xml:11446
14870 "Things went better for us when the government gave its argument; for now the "
14871 "Court picked up on the core of our claim. As Justice Scalia asked Solicitor "
14875 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
14876 #: freeculture.xml:11452
14878 "justice scalia: You say that the functional equivalent of an unlimited time "
14879 "would be a violation [of the Constitution], but that's precisely the "
14880 "argument that's being made by petitioners here, that a limited time which is "
14881 "extendable is the functional equivalent of an unlimited time."
14884 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14885 #: freeculture.xml:11460
14887 "When Olson was finished, it was my turn to give a closing rebuttal. Olson's "
14888 "flailing had revived my anger. But my anger still was directed to the "
14889 "academic, not the practical. The government was arguing as if this were the "
14890 "first case ever to consider limits on Congress's Copyright and Patent Clause "
14891 "power. Ever the professor and not the advocate, I closed by pointing out the "
14892 "long history of the Court imposing limits on Congress's power in the name of "
14893 "the Copyright and Patent Clause— indeed, the very first case striking "
14894 "a law of Congress as exceeding a specific enumerated power was based upon "
14895 "the Copyright and Patent Clause. All true. But it wasn't going to move the "
14896 "Court to my side."
14900 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14901 #: freeculture.xml:11473
14903 "As I left the court that day, I knew there were a hundred points I wished I "
14904 "could remake. There were a hundred questions I wished I had answered "
14905 "differently. But one way of thinking about this case left me optimistic."
14908 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14909 #: freeculture.xml:11481
14911 "The government had been asked over and over again, what is the limit? Over "
14912 "and over again, it had answered there is no limit. This was precisely the "
14913 "answer I wanted the Court to hear. For I could not imagine how the Court "
14914 "could understand that the government believed Congress's power was unlimited "
14915 "under the terms of the Copyright Clause, and sustain the government's "
14916 "argument. The solicitor general had made my argument for me. No matter how "
14917 "often I tried, I could not understand how the Court could find that "
14918 "Congress's power under the Commerce Clause was limited, but under the "
14919 "Copyright Clause, unlimited. In those rare moments when I let myself believe "
14920 "that we may have prevailed, it was because I felt this Court—in "
14921 "particular, the Conservatives—would feel itself constrained by the "
14922 "rule of law that it had established elsewhere."
14925 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14926 #: freeculture.xml:11496
14928 "The morning of January 15, 2003, I was five minutes late to the office and "
14929 "missed the 7:00 A.M. call from the Supreme Court clerk. Listening to the "
14930 "message, I could tell in an instant that she had bad news to report.The "
14931 "Supreme Court had affirmed the decision of the Court of Appeals. Seven "
14932 "justices had voted in the majority. There were two dissents."
14935 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14936 #: freeculture.xml:11503
14938 "A few seconds later, the opinions arrived by e-mail. I took the phone off "
14939 "the hook, posted an announcement to our blog, and sat down to see where I "
14940 "had been wrong in my reasoning."
14943 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14944 #: freeculture.xml:11508
14946 "My <emphasis>reasoning</emphasis>. Here was a case that pitted all the money "
14947 "in the world against <emphasis>reasoning</emphasis>. And here was the last "
14948 "naïve law professor, scouring the pages, looking for reasoning."
14951 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14952 #: freeculture.xml:11514
14954 "I first scoured the opinion, looking for how the Court would distinguish the "
14955 "principle in this case from the principle in "
14956 "<citetitle>Lopez</citetitle>. The argument was nowhere to be found. The case "
14957 "was not even cited. The argument that was the core argument of our case did "
14958 "not even appear in the Court's opinion."
14962 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14963 #: freeculture.xml:11523
14965 "Justice Ginsburg simply ignored the enumerated powers argument. Consistent "
14966 "with her view that Congress's power was not limited generally, she had found "
14967 "Congress's power not limited here."
14970 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14971 #: freeculture.xml:11528
14973 "Her opinion was perfectly reasonable—for her, and for Justice "
14974 "Souter. Neither believes in <citetitle>Lopez</citetitle>. It would be too "
14975 "much to expect them to write an opinion that recognized, much less "
14976 "explained, the doctrine they had worked so hard to defeat."
14979 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14980 #: freeculture.xml:11534
14982 "But as I realized what had happened, I couldn't quite believe what I was "
14983 "reading. I had said there was no way this Court could reconcile limited "
14984 "powers with the Commerce Clause and unlimited powers with the Progress "
14985 "Clause. It had never even occurred to me that they could reconcile the two "
14986 "simply <emphasis>by not addressing the argument</emphasis>. There was no "
14987 "inconsistency because they would not talk about the two together. There was "
14988 "therefore no principle that followed from the <citetitle>Lopez</citetitle> "
14989 "case: In that context, Congress's power would be limited, but in this "
14990 "context it would not."
14993 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
14994 #: freeculture.xml:11545
14996 "Yet by what right did they get to choose which of the framers' values they "
14997 "would respect? By what right did they—the silent five—get to "
14998 "select the part of the Constitution they would enforce based on the values "
14999 "they thought important? We were right back to the argument that I said I "
15000 "hated at the start: I had failed to convince them that the issue here was "
15001 "important, and I had failed to recognize that however much I might hate a "
15002 "system in which the Court gets to pick the constitutional values that it "
15003 "will respect, that is the system we have."
15006 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15007 #: freeculture.xml:11557
15009 "Justices Breyer and Stevens wrote very strong dissents. Stevens's opinion "
15010 "was crafted internal to the law: He argued that the tradition of "
15011 "intellectual property law should not support this unjustified extension of "
15012 "terms. He based his argument on a parallel analysis that had governed in the "
15013 "context of patents (so had we). But the rest of the Court discounted the "
15014 "parallel—without explaining how the very same words in the Progress "
15015 "Clause could come to mean totally different things depending upon whether "
15016 "the words were about patents or copyrights. The Court let Justice Stevens's "
15017 "charge go unanswered."
15021 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15022 #: freeculture.xml:11570
15024 "Justice Breyer's opinion, perhaps the best opinion he has ever written, was "
15025 "external to the Constitution. He argued that the term of copyrights has "
15026 "become so long as to be effectively unlimited. We had said that under the "
15027 "current term, a copyright gave an author 99.8 percent of the value of a "
15028 "perpetual term. Breyer said we were wrong, that the actual number was "
15029 "99.9997 percent of a perpetual term. Either way, the point was clear: If the "
15030 "Constitution said a term had to be \"limited,\" and the existing term was so "
15031 "long as to be effectively unlimited, then it was unconstitutional."
15034 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15035 #: freeculture.xml:11581
15037 "These two justices understood all the arguments we had made. But because "
15038 "neither believed in the <citetitle>Lopez</citetitle> case, neither was "
15039 "willing to push it as a reason to reject this extension. The case was "
15040 "decided without anyone having addressed the argument that we had carried "
15041 "from Judge Sentelle. It was <citetitle>Hamlet</citetitle> without the "
15045 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15046 #: freeculture.xml:11588
15048 "Defeat brings depression. They say it is a sign of health when depression "
15049 "gives way to anger. My anger came quickly, but it didn't cure the "
15050 "depression. This anger was of two sorts."
15053 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15054 #: freeculture.xml:11593
15056 "It was first anger with the five \"Conservatives.\" It would have been one "
15057 "thing for them to have explained why the principle of "
15058 "<citetitle>Lopez</citetitle> didn't apply in this case. That wouldn't have "
15059 "been a very convincing argument, I don't believe, having read it made by "
15060 "others, and having tried to make it myself. But it at least would have been "
15061 "an act of integrity. These justices in particular have repeatedly said that "
15062 "the proper mode of interpreting the Constitution is \"originalism\"—to "
15063 "first understand the framers' text, interpreted in their context, in light "
15064 "of the structure of the Constitution. That method had produced "
15065 "<citetitle>Lopez</citetitle> and many other \"originalist\" rulings. Where "
15066 "was their \"originalism\" now?"
15070 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15071 #: freeculture.xml:11606
15073 "Here, they had joined an opinion that never once tried to explain what the "
15074 "framers had meant by crafting the Progress Clause as they did; they joined "
15075 "an opinion that never once tried to explain how the structure of that clause "
15076 "would affect the interpretation of Congress's power. And they joined an "
15077 "opinion that didn't even try to explain why this grant of power could be "
15078 "unlimited, whereas the Commerce Clause would be limited. In short, they had "
15079 "joined an opinion that did not apply to, and was inconsistent with, their "
15080 "own method for interpreting the Constitution. This opinion may well have "
15081 "yielded a result that they liked. It did not produce a reason that was "
15082 "consistent with their own principles."
15085 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15086 #: freeculture.xml:11621
15088 "My anger with the Conservatives quickly yielded to anger with myself. For I "
15089 "had let a view of the law that I liked interfere with a view of the law as "
15093 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15094 #: freeculture.xml:11628
15096 "Most lawyers, and most law professors, have little patience for idealism "
15097 "about courts in general and this Supreme Court in particular. Most have a "
15098 "much more pragmatic view. When Don Ayer said that this case would be won "
15099 "based on whether I could convince the Justices that the framers' values were "
15100 "important, I fought the idea, because I didn't want to believe that that is "
15101 "how this Court decides. I insisted on arguing this case as if it were a "
15102 "simple application of a set of principles. I had an argument that followed "
15103 "in logic. I didn't need to waste my time showing it should also follow in "
15108 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15109 #: freeculture.xml:11639
15111 "As I read back over the transcript from that argument in October, I can see "
15112 "a hundred places where the answers could have taken the conversation in "
15113 "different directions, where the truth about the harm that this unchecked "
15114 "power will cause could have been made clear to this Court. Justice Kennedy "
15115 "in good faith wanted to be shown. I, idiotically, corrected his "
15116 "question. Justice Souter in good faith wanted to be shown the First "
15117 "Amendment harms. I, like a math teacher, reframed the question to make the "
15118 "logical point. I had shown them how they could strike this law of Congress "
15119 "if they wanted to. There were a hundred places where I could have helped "
15120 "them want to, yet my stubbornness, my refusal to give in, stopped me. I have "
15121 "stood before hundreds of audiences trying to persuade; I have used passion "
15122 "in that effort to persuade; but I refused to stand before this audience and "
15123 "try to persuade with the passion I had used elsewhere. It was not the basis "
15124 "on which a court should decide the issue."
15127 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15128 #: freeculture.xml:11659
15130 "Would it have been different if I had argued it differently? Would it have "
15131 "been different if Don Ayer had argued it? Or Charles Fried? Or Kathleen "
15132 "Sullivan? <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
15135 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15136 #: freeculture.xml:11665
15138 "My friends huddled around me to insist it would not. The Court was not "
15139 "ready, my friends insisted. This was a loss that was destined. It would take "
15140 "a great deal more to show our society why our framers were right. And when "
15141 "we do that, we will be able to show that Court."
15144 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15145 #: freeculture.xml:11671
15147 "Maybe, but I doubt it. These Justices have no financial interest in doing "
15148 "anything except the right thing. They are not lobbied. They have little "
15149 "reason to resist doing right. I can't help but think that if I had stepped "
15150 "down from this pretty picture of dispassionate justice, I could have "
15154 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15155 #: freeculture.xml:11678
15157 "And even if I couldn't, then that doesn't excuse what happened in "
15158 "January. For at the start of this case, one of America's leading "
15159 "intellectual property professors stated publicly that my bringing this case "
15160 "was a mistake. \"The Court is not ready,\" Peter Jaszi said; this issue "
15161 "should not be raised until it is. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" "
15166 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15167 #: freeculture.xml:11686
15169 "After the argument and after the decision, Peter said to me, and publicly, "
15170 "that he was wrong. But if indeed that Court could not have been persuaded, "
15171 "then that is all the evidence that's needed to know that here again Peter "
15172 "was right. Either I was not ready to argue this case in a way that would do "
15173 "some good or they were not ready to hear this case in a way that would do "
15174 "some good. Either way, the decision to bring this case—a decision I "
15175 "had made four years before—was wrong. While the reaction to the Sonny "
15176 "Bono Act itself was almost unanimously negative, the reaction to the Court's "
15177 "decision was mixed. No one, at least in the press, tried to say that "
15178 "extending the term of copyright was a good idea. We had won that battle over "
15179 "ideas. Where the decision was praised, it was praised by papers that had "
15180 "been skeptical of the Court's activism in other cases. Deference was a good "
15181 "thing, even if it left standing a silly law. But where the decision was "
15182 "attacked, it was attacked because it left standing a silly and harmful "
15183 "law. <citetitle>The New York Times</citetitle> wrote in its editorial,"
15186 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><blockquote><para>
15187 #: freeculture.xml:11707
15189 "In effect, the Supreme Court's decision makes it likely that we are seeing "
15190 "the beginning of the end of public domain and the birth of copyright "
15191 "perpetuity. The public domain has been a grand experiment, one that should "
15192 "not be allowed to die. The ability to draw freely on the entire creative "
15193 "output of humanity is one of the reasons we live in a time of such fruitful "
15194 "creative ferment."
15197 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
15198 #: freeculture.xml:11721
15199 msgid "Bolling, Ruben"
15202 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15203 #: freeculture.xml:11716
15205 "The best responses were in the cartoons. There was a gaggle of hilarious "
15206 "images—of Mickey in jail and the like. The best, from my view of the "
15207 "case, was Ruben Bolling's, reproduced on the next page. The \"powerful and "
15208 "wealthy\" line is a bit unfair. But the punch in the face felt exactly like "
15209 "that. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
15212 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15213 #: freeculture.xml:11724
15215 "The image that will always stick in my head is that evoked by the quote from "
15216 "<citetitle>The New York Times</citetitle>. That \"grand experiment\" we call "
15217 "the \"public domain\" is over? When I can make light of it, I think, "
15218 "\"Honey, I shrunk the Constitution.\" But I can rarely make light of it. We "
15219 "had in our Constitution a commitment to free culture. In the case that I "
15220 "fathered, the Supreme Court effectively renounced that commitment. A better "
15221 "lawyer would have made them see differently."
15224 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><title>
15225 #: freeculture.xml:11735
15226 msgid "CHAPTER FOURTEEN: Eldred II"
15229 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15230 #: freeculture.xml:11737
15232 "The day <citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> was decided, fate would have it that I "
15233 "was to travel to Washington, D.C. (The day the rehearing petition in "
15234 "<citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> was denied—meaning the case was really "
15235 "finally over—fate would have it that I was giving a speech to "
15236 "technologists at Disney World.) This was a particularly long flight to my "
15237 "least favorite city. The drive into the city from Dulles was delayed because "
15238 "of traffic, so I opened up my computer and wrote an op-ed piece."
15241 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15242 #: freeculture.xml:11747
15244 "It was an act of contrition. During the whole of the flight from San "
15245 "Francisco to Washington, I had heard over and over again in my head the same "
15246 "advice from Don Ayer: You need to make them see why it is important. And "
15247 "alternating with that command was the question of Justice Kennedy: \"For all "
15248 "these years the act has impeded progress in science and the useful arts. I "
15249 "just don't see any empirical evidence for that.\" And so, having failed in "
15250 "the argument of constitutional principle, finally, I turned to an argument "
15255 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15256 #: freeculture.xml:11757
15258 "<citetitle>The New York Times</citetitle> published the piece. In it, I "
15259 "proposed a simple fix: Fifty years after a work has been published, the "
15260 "copyright owner would be required to register the work and pay a small "
15261 "fee. If he paid the fee, he got the benefit of the full term of "
15262 "copyright. If he did not, the work passed into the public domain."
15265 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15266 #: freeculture.xml:11765
15268 "We called this the Eldred Act, but that was just to give it a name. Eric "
15269 "Eldred was kind enough to let his name be used once again, but as he said "
15270 "early on, it won't get passed unless it has another name."
15273 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15274 #: freeculture.xml:11770
15276 "Or another two names. For depending upon your perspective, this is either "
15277 "the \"Public Domain Enhancement Act\" or the \"Copyright Term Deregulation "
15278 "Act.\" Either way, the essence of the idea is clear and obvious: Remove "
15279 "copyright where it is doing nothing except blocking access and the spread of "
15280 "knowledge. Leave it for as long as Congress allows for those works where its "
15281 "worth is at least $1. But for everything else, let the content go."
15284 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
15285 #: freeculture.xml:11778 freeculture.xml:11977
15286 msgid "Forbes, Steve"
15289 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15290 #: freeculture.xml:11780
15292 "The reaction to this idea was amazingly strong. Steve Forbes endorsed it in "
15293 "an editorial. I received an avalanche of e-mail and letters expressing "
15294 "support. When you focus the issue on lost creativity, people can see the "
15295 "copyright system makes no sense. As a good Republican might say, here "
15296 "government regulation is simply getting in the way of innovation and "
15297 "creativity. And as a good Democrat might say, here the government is "
15298 "blocking access and the spread of knowledge for no good reason. Indeed, "
15299 "there is no real difference between Democrats and Republicans on this "
15300 "issue. Anyone can recognize the stupid harm of the present system."
15303 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15304 #: freeculture.xml:11792
15306 "Indeed, many recognized the obvious benefit of the registration "
15307 "requirement. For one of the hardest things about the current system for "
15308 "people who want to license content is that there is no obvious place to look "
15309 "for the current copyright owners. Since registration is not required, since "
15310 "marking content is not required, since no formality at all is required, it "
15311 "is often impossibly hard to locate copyright owners to ask permission to use "
15312 "or license their work. This system would lower these costs, by establishing "
15313 "at least one registry where copyright owners could be identified."
15316 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
15317 #: freeculture.xml:11802
15318 msgid "Berlin Act (1908)"
15321 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><indexterm><primary>
15322 #: freeculture.xml:11803 freeculture.xml:11842
15323 msgid "Berne Convention (1908)"
15327 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><footnote><para>
15328 #: freeculture.xml:11810
15330 "Until the 1908 Berlin Act of the Berne Convention, national copyright "
15331 "legislation sometimes made protection depend upon compliance with "
15332 "formalities such as registration, deposit, and affixation of notice of the "
15333 "author's claim of copyright. However, starting with the 1908 act, every text "
15334 "of the Convention has provided that \"the enjoyment and the exercise\" of "
15335 "rights guaranteed by the Convention \"shall not be subject to any "
15336 "formality.\" The prohibition against formalities is presently embodied in "
15337 "Article 5(2) of the Paris Text of the Berne Convention. Many countries "
15338 "continue to impose some form of deposit or registration requirement, albeit "
15339 "not as a condition of copyright. French law, for example, requires the "
15340 "deposit of copies of works in national repositories, principally the "
15341 "National Museum. Copies of books published in the United Kingdom must be "
15342 "deposited in the British Library. The German Copyright Act provides for a "
15343 "Registrar of Authors where the author's true name can be filed in the case "
15344 "of anonymous or pseudonymous works. Paul Goldstein, <citetitle>International "
15345 "Intellectual Property Law, Cases and Materials</citetitle> (New York: "
15346 "Foundation Press, 2001), 153–54."
15349 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15350 #: freeculture.xml:11806
15352 "As I described in chapter 10, formalities in copyright law were removed in "
15353 "1976, when Congress followed the Europeans by abandoning any formal "
15354 "requirement before a copyright is granted.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
15355 "id=\"0\"/> The Europeans are said to view copyright as a \"natural right.\" "
15356 "Natural rights don't need forms to exist. Traditions, like the "
15357 "Anglo-American tradition that required copyright owners to follow form if "
15358 "their rights were to be protected, did not, the Europeans thought, properly "
15359 "respect the dignity of the author. My right as a creator turns on my "
15360 "creativity, not upon the special favor of the government."
15363 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15364 #: freeculture.xml:11836
15366 "That's great rhetoric. It sounds wonderfully romantic. But it is absurd "
15367 "copyright policy. It is absurd especially for authors, because a world "
15368 "without formalities harms the creator. The ability to spread \"Walt Disney "
15369 "creativity\" is destroyed when there is no simple way to know what's "
15370 "protected and what's not."
15373 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15374 #: freeculture.xml:11844
15376 "The fight against formalities achieved its first real victory in Berlin in "
15377 "1908. International copyright lawyers amended the Berne Convention in 1908, "
15378 "to require copyright terms of life plus fifty years, as well as the "
15379 "abolition of copyright formalities. The formalities were hated because the "
15380 "stories of inadvertent loss were increasingly common. It was as if a Charles "
15381 "Dickens character ran all copyright offices, and the failure to dot an "
15382 "<citetitle>i</citetitle> or cross a <citetitle>t</citetitle> resulted in the "
15383 "loss of widows' only income."
15386 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15387 #: freeculture.xml:11854
15389 "These complaints were real and sensible. And the strictness of the "
15390 "formalities, especially in the United States, was absurd. The law should "
15391 "always have ways of forgiving innocent mistakes. There is no reason "
15392 "copyright law couldn't, as well. Rather than abandoning formalities totally, "
15393 "the response in Berlin should have been to embrace a more equitable system "
15397 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15398 #: freeculture.xml:11862
15400 "Even that would have been resisted, however, because registration in the "
15401 "nineteenth and twentieth centuries was still expensive. It was also a "
15402 "hassle. The abolishment of formalities promised not only to save the "
15403 "starving widows, but also to lighten an unnecessary regulatory burden "
15404 "imposed upon creators."
15408 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15409 #: freeculture.xml:11870
15411 "In addition to the practical complaint of authors in 1908, there was a moral "
15412 "claim as well. There was no reason that creative property should be a "
15413 "second-class form of property. If a carpenter builds a table, his rights "
15414 "over the table don't depend upon filing a form with the government. He has "
15415 "a property right over the table \"naturally,\" and he can assert that right "
15416 "against anyone who would steal the table, whether or not he has informed the "
15417 "government of his ownership of the table."
15420 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15421 #: freeculture.xml:11882
15423 "This argument is correct, but its implications are misleading. For the "
15424 "argument in favor of formalities does not depend upon creative property "
15425 "being second-class property. The argument in favor of formalities turns upon "
15426 "the special problems that creative property presents. The law of "
15427 "formalities responds to the special physics of creative property, to assure "
15428 "that it can be efficiently and fairly spread."
15431 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15432 #: freeculture.xml:11891
15434 "No one thinks, for example, that land is second-class property just because "
15435 "you have to register a deed with a court if your sale of land is to be "
15436 "effective. And few would think a car is second-class property just because "
15437 "you must register the car with the state and tag it with a license. In both "
15438 "of those cases, everyone sees that there is an important reason to secure "
15439 "registration—both because it makes the markets more efficient and "
15440 "because it better secures the rights of the owner. Without a registration "
15441 "system for land, landowners would perpetually have to guard their "
15442 "property. With registration, they can simply point the police to a "
15443 "deed. Without a registration system for cars, auto theft would be much "
15444 "easier. With a registration system, the thief has a high burden to sell a "
15445 "stolen car. A slight burden is placed on the property owner, but those "
15446 "burdens produce a much better system of protection for property generally."
15449 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15450 #: freeculture.xml:11907
15452 "It is similarly special physics that makes formalities important in "
15453 "copyright law. Unlike a carpenter's table, there's nothing in nature that "
15454 "makes it relatively obvious who might own a particular bit of creative "
15455 "property. A recording of Lyle Lovett's latest album can exist in a billion "
15456 "places without anything necessarily linking it back to a particular "
15457 "owner. And like a car, there's no way to buy and sell creative property with "
15458 "confidence unless there is some simple way to authenticate who is the author "
15459 "and what rights he has. Simple transactions are destroyed in a world without "
15460 "formalities. Complex, expensive, <emphasis>lawyer</emphasis> transactions "
15461 "take their place. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
15464 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15465 #: freeculture.xml:11922
15467 "This was the understanding of the problem with the Sonny Bono Act that we "
15468 "tried to demonstrate to the Court. This was the part it didn't \"get.\" "
15469 "Because we live in a system without formalities, there is no way easily to "
15470 "build upon or use culture from our past. If copyright terms were, as Justice "
15471 "Story said they would be, \"short,\" then this wouldn't matter much. For "
15472 "fourteen years, under the framers' system, a work would be presumptively "
15473 "controlled. After fourteen years, it would be presumptively uncontrolled."
15476 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15477 #: freeculture.xml:11932
15479 "But now that copyrights can be just about a century long, the inability to "
15480 "know what is protected and what is not protected becomes a huge and obvious "
15481 "burden on the creative process. If the only way a library can offer an "
15482 "Internet exhibit about the New Deal is to hire a lawyer to clear the rights "
15483 "to every image and sound, then the copyright system is burdening creativity "
15484 "in a way that has never been seen before <emphasis>because there are no "
15485 "formalities</emphasis>."
15488 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15489 #: freeculture.xml:11941
15491 "The Eldred Act was designed to respond to exactly this problem. If it is "
15492 "worth $1 to you, then register your work and you can get the longer "
15493 "term. Others will know how to contact you and, therefore, how to get your "
15494 "permission if they want to use your work. And you will get the benefit of an "
15495 "extended copyright term."
15498 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15499 #: freeculture.xml:11948
15501 "If it isn't worth it to you to register to get the benefit of an extended "
15502 "term, then it shouldn't be worth it for the government to defend your "
15503 "monopoly over that work either. The work should pass into the public domain "
15504 "where anyone can copy it, or build archives with it, or create a movie based "
15505 "on it. It should become free if it is not worth $1 to you."
15508 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15509 #: freeculture.xml:11955
15511 "Some worry about the burden on authors. Won't the burden of registering the "
15512 "work mean that the $1 is really misleading? Isn't the hassle worth more than "
15513 "$1? Isn't that the real problem with registration?"
15517 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15518 #: freeculture.xml:11961
15520 "It is. The hassle is terrible. The system that exists now is awful. I "
15521 "completely agree that the Copyright Office has done a terrible job (no doubt "
15522 "because they are terribly funded) in enabling simple and cheap "
15523 "registrations. Any real solution to the problem of formalities must address "
15524 "the real problem of <emphasis>governments</emphasis> standing at the core of "
15525 "any system of formalities. In this book, I offer such a solution. That "
15526 "solution essentially remakes the Copyright Office. For now, assume it was "
15527 "Amazon that ran the registration system. Assume it was one-click "
15528 "registration. The Eldred Act would propose a simple, one-click registration "
15529 "fifty years after a work was published. Based upon historical data, that "
15530 "system would move up to 98 percent of commercial work, commercial work that "
15531 "no longer had a commercial life, into the public domain within fifty "
15532 "years. What do you think?"
15535 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15536 #: freeculture.xml:11979
15538 "When Steve Forbes endorsed the idea, some in Washington began to pay "
15539 "attention. Many people contacted me pointing to representatives who might be "
15540 "willing to introduce the Eldred Act. And I had a few who directly suggested "
15541 "that they might be willing to take the first step."
15544 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para><indexterm><primary>
15545 #: freeculture.xml:11992
15546 msgid "Lofgren, Zoe"
15549 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15550 #: freeculture.xml:11985
15552 "One representative, Zoe Lofgren of California, went so far as to get the "
15553 "bill drafted. The draft solved any problem with international law. It "
15554 "imposed the simplest requirement upon copyright owners possible. In May "
15555 "2003, it looked as if the bill would be introduced. On May 16, I posted on "
15556 "the Eldred Act blog, \"we are close.\" There was a general reaction in the "
15557 "blog community that something good might happen here. <placeholder "
15558 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
15561 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15562 #: freeculture.xml:11995
15564 "But at this stage, the lobbyists began to intervene. Jack Valenti and the "
15565 "MPAA general counsel came to the congresswoman's office to give the view of "
15566 "the MPAA. Aided by his lawyer, as Valenti told me, Valenti informed the "
15567 "congresswoman that the MPAA would oppose the Eldred Act. The reasons are "
15568 "embarrassingly thin. More importantly, their thinness shows something clear "
15569 "about what this debate is really about."
15573 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15574 #: freeculture.xml:12003
15576 "The MPAA argued first that Congress had \"firmly rejected the central "
15577 "concept in the proposed bill\"—that copyrights be renewed. That was "
15578 "true, but irrelevant, as Congress's \"firm rejection\" had occurred long "
15579 "before the Internet made subsequent uses much more likely. Second, they "
15580 "argued that the proposal would harm poor copyright owners—apparently "
15581 "those who could not afford the $1 fee. Third, they argued that Congress had "
15582 "determined that extending a copyright term would encourage restoration "
15583 "work. Maybe in the case of the small percentage of work covered by copyright "
15584 "law that is still commercially valuable, but again this was irrelevant, as "
15585 "the proposal would not cut off the extended term unless the $1 fee was not "
15586 "paid. Fourth, the MPAA argued that the bill would impose \"enormous\" costs, "
15587 "since a registration system is not free. True enough, but those costs are "
15588 "certainly less than the costs of clearing the rights for a copyright whose "
15589 "owner is not known. Fifth, they worried about the risks if the copyright to "
15590 "a story underlying a film were to pass into the public domain. But what risk "
15591 "is that? If it is in the public domain, then the film is a valid derivative "
15595 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15596 #: freeculture.xml:12024
15598 "Finally, the MPAA argued that existing law enabled copyright owners to do "
15599 "this if they wanted. But the whole point is that there are thousands of "
15600 "copyright owners who don't even know they have a copyright to give. Whether "
15601 "they are free to give away their copyright or not—a controversial "
15602 "claim in any case—unless they know about a copyright, they're not "
15606 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15607 #: freeculture.xml:12032
15609 "At the beginning of this book, I told two stories about the law reacting to "
15610 "changes in technology. In the one, common sense prevailed. In the other, "
15611 "common sense was delayed. The difference between the two stories was the "
15612 "power of the opposition—the power of the side that fought to defend "
15613 "the status quo. In both cases, a new technology threatened old "
15614 "interests. But in only one case did those interest's have the power to "
15615 "protect themselves against this new competitive threat."
15618 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15619 #: freeculture.xml:12042
15621 "I used these two cases as a way to frame the war that this book has been "
15622 "about. For here, too, a new technology is forcing the law to react. And "
15623 "here, too, we should ask, is the law following or resisting common sense? If "
15624 "common sense supports the law, what explains this common sense?"
15628 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15629 #: freeculture.xml:12051
15631 "When the issue is piracy, it is right for the law to back the copyright "
15632 "owners. The commercial piracy that I described is wrong and harmful, and the "
15633 "law should work to eliminate it. When the issue is p2p sharing, it is easy "
15634 "to understand why the law backs the owners still: Much of this sharing is "
15635 "wrong, even if much is harmless. When the issue is copyright terms for the "
15636 "Mickey Mouses of the world, it is possible still to understand why the law "
15637 "favors Hollywood: Most people don't recognize the reasons for limiting "
15638 "copyright terms; it is thus still possible to see good faith within the "
15642 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15643 #: freeculture.xml:12062
15645 "But when the copyright owners oppose a proposal such as the Eldred Act, "
15646 "then, finally, there is an example that lays bare the naked selfinterest "
15647 "driving this war. This act would free an extraordinary range of content that "
15648 "is otherwise unused. It wouldn't interfere with any copyright owner's desire "
15649 "to exercise continued control over his content. It would simply liberate "
15650 "what Kevin Kelly calls the \"Dark Content\" that fills archives around the "
15651 "world. So when the warriors oppose a change like this, we should ask one "
15655 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15656 #: freeculture.xml:12072
15657 msgid "What does this industry really want?"
15660 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15661 #: freeculture.xml:12075
15663 "With very little effort, the warriors could protect their content. So the "
15664 "effort to block something like the Eldred Act is not really about protecting "
15665 "<emphasis>their</emphasis> content. The effort to block the Eldred Act is an "
15666 "effort to assure that nothing more passes into the public domain. It is "
15667 "another step to assure that the public domain will never compete, that there "
15668 "will be no use of content that is not commercially controlled, and that "
15669 "there will be no commercial use of content that doesn't require "
15670 "<emphasis>their</emphasis> permission first."
15673 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15674 #: freeculture.xml:12086
15676 "The opposition to the Eldred Act reveals how extreme the other side is. The "
15677 "most powerful and sexy and well loved of lobbies really has as its aim not "
15678 "the protection of \"property\" but the rejection of a tradition. Their aim "
15679 "is not simply to protect what is theirs. <emphasis>Their aim is to assure "
15680 "that all there is is what is theirs</emphasis>."
15684 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15685 #: freeculture.xml:12094
15687 "It is not hard to understand why the warriors take this view. It is not hard "
15688 "to see why it would benefit them if the competition of the public domain "
15689 "tied to the Internet could somehow be quashed. Just as RCA feared the "
15690 "competition of FM, they fear the competition of a public domain connected to "
15691 "a public that now has the means to create with it and to share its own "
15695 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15696 #: freeculture.xml:12106
15698 "What is hard to understand is why the public takes this view. It is as if "
15699 "the law made airplanes trespassers. The MPAA stands with the Causbys and "
15700 "demands that their remote and useless property rights be respected, so that "
15701 "these remote and forgotten copyright holders might block the progress of "
15705 #. type: Content of: <book><part><chapter><para>
15706 #: freeculture.xml:12113
15708 "All this seems to follow easily from this untroubled acceptance of the "
15709 "\"property\" in intellectual property. Common sense supports it, and so long "
15710 "as it does, the assaults will rain down upon the technologies of the "
15711 "Internet. The consequence will be an increasing \"permission society.\" The "
15712 "past can be cultivated only if you can identify the owner and gain "
15713 "permission to build upon his work. The future will be controlled by this "
15714 "dead (and often unfindable) hand of the past."
15717 #. type: Content of: <book><part><title>
15718 #: freeculture.xml:12125
15722 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15723 #: freeculture.xml:12128
15725 "There are more than 35 million people with the AIDS virus "
15726 "worldwide. Twenty-five million of them live in sub-Saharan Africa. "
15727 "Seventeen million have already died. Seventeen million Africans is "
15728 "proportional percentage-wise to seven million Americans. More importantly, "
15729 "it is seventeen million Africans."
15732 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15733 #: freeculture.xml:12135
15735 "There is no cure for AIDS, but there are drugs to slow its progression. "
15736 "These antiretroviral therapies are still experimental, but they have already "
15737 "had a dramatic effect. In the United States, AIDS patients who regularly "
15738 "take a cocktail of these drugs increase their life expectancy by ten to "
15739 "twenty years. For some, the drugs make the disease almost invisible."
15743 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
15744 #: freeculture.xml:12150
15746 "Commission on Intellectual Property Rights, \"Final Report: Integrating "
15747 "Intellectual Property Rights and Development Policy\" (London, 2002), "
15748 "available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
15749 "#55</ulink>. According to a World Health Organization press release issued 9 "
15750 "July 2002, only 230,000 of the 6 million who need drugs in the developing "
15751 "world receive them—and half of them are in Brazil."
15754 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15755 #: freeculture.xml:12143
15757 "These drugs are expensive. When they were first introduced in the United "
15758 "States, they cost between $10,000 and $15,000 per person per year. Today, "
15759 "some cost $25,000 per year. At these prices, of course, no African nation "
15760 "can afford the drugs for the vast majority of its population: $15,000 is "
15761 "thirty times the per capita gross national product of Zimbabwe. At these "
15762 "prices, the drugs are totally unavailable.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
15767 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15768 #: freeculture.xml:12161
15770 "These prices are not high because the ingredients of the drugs are "
15771 "expensive. These prices are high because the drugs are protected by "
15772 "patents. The drug companies that produced these life-saving mixes enjoy at "
15773 "least a twenty-year monopoly for their inventions. They use that monopoly "
15774 "power to extract the most they can from the market. That power is in turn "
15775 "used to keep the prices high."
15778 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15779 #: freeculture.xml:12169
15781 "There are many who are skeptical of patents, especially drug patents. I am "
15782 "not. Indeed, of all the areas of research that might be supported by "
15783 "patents, drug research is, in my view, the clearest case where patents are "
15784 "needed. The patent gives the drug company some assurance that if it is "
15785 "successful in inventing a new drug to treat a disease, it will be able to "
15786 "earn back its investment and more. This is socially an extremely valuable "
15787 "incentive. I am the last person who would argue that the law should abolish "
15788 "it, at least without other changes."
15791 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15792 #: freeculture.xml:12180
15794 "But it is one thing to support patents, even drug patents. It is another "
15795 "thing to determine how best to deal with a crisis. And as African leaders "
15796 "began to recognize the devastation that AIDS was bringing, they started "
15797 "looking for ways to import HIV treatments at costs significantly below the "
15801 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><indexterm><primary>
15802 #: freeculture.xml:12198 freeculture.xml:12627
15803 msgid "Braithwaite, John"
15806 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
15807 #: freeculture.xml:12196
15809 "See Peter Drahos with John Braithwaite, <citetitle>Information Feudalism: "
15810 "Who Owns the Knowledge Economy?</citetitle> (New York: The New Press, 2003), "
15811 "37. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder "
15812 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
15815 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15816 #: freeculture.xml:12187
15818 "In 1997, South Africa tried one tack. It passed a law to allow the "
15819 "importation of patented medicines that had been produced or sold in another "
15820 "nation's market with the consent of the patent owner. For example, if the "
15821 "drug was sold in India, it could be imported into Africa from India. This is "
15822 "called \"parallel importation,\" and it is generally permitted under "
15823 "international trade law and is specifically permitted within the European "
15824 "Union.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
15828 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
15829 #: freeculture.xml:12209
15831 "International Intellectual Property Institute (IIPI), <citetitle>Patent "
15832 "Protection and Access to HIV/AIDS Pharmaceuticals in Sub-Saharan Africa, a "
15833 "Report Prepared for the World Intellectual Property Organization</citetitle> "
15834 "(Washington, D.C., 2000), 14, available at <ulink "
15835 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #56</ulink>. For a firsthand "
15836 "account of the struggle over South Africa, see Hearing Before the "
15837 "Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources, House "
15838 "Committee on Government Reform, H. Rep., 1st sess., Ser. No. 106-126 (22 "
15839 "July 1999), 150–57 (statement of James Love)."
15843 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
15844 #: freeculture.xml:12236
15846 "International Intellectual Property Institute (IIPI), <citetitle>Patent "
15847 "Protection and Access to HIV/AIDS Pharmaceuticals in Sub-Saharan Africa, a "
15848 "Report Prepared for the World Intellectual Property Organization</citetitle> "
15849 "(Washington, D.C., 2000), 15."
15852 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15853 #: freeculture.xml:12203
15855 "However, the United States government opposed the bill. Indeed, more than "
15856 "opposed. As the International Intellectual Property Association "
15857 "characterized it, \"The U.S. government pressured South Africa . . . not to "
15858 "permit compulsory licensing or parallel imports.\"<placeholder "
15859 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Through the Office of the United States Trade "
15860 "Representative, the government asked South Africa to change the "
15861 "law—and to add pressure to that request, in 1998, the USTR listed "
15862 "South Africa for possible trade sanctions. That same year, more than forty "
15863 "pharmaceutical companies began proceedings in the South African courts to "
15864 "challenge the government's actions. The United States was then joined by "
15865 "other governments from the EU. Their claim, and the claim of the "
15866 "pharmaceutical companies, was that South Africa was violating its "
15867 "obligations under international law by discriminating against a particular "
15868 "kind of patent— pharmaceutical patents. The demand of these "
15869 "governments, with the United States in the lead, was that South Africa "
15870 "respect these patents as it respects any other patent, regardless of any "
15871 "effect on the treatment of AIDS within South Africa.<placeholder "
15872 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/>"
15875 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15876 #: freeculture.xml:12242
15878 "We should place the intervention by the United States in context. No doubt "
15879 "patents are not the most important reason that Africans don't have access to "
15880 "drugs. Poverty and the total absence of an effective health care "
15881 "infrastructure matter more. But whether patents are the most important "
15882 "reason or not, the price of drugs has an effect on their demand, and patents "
15883 "affect price. And so, whether massive or marginal, there was an effect from "
15884 "our government's intervention to stop the flow of medications into Africa."
15887 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15888 #: freeculture.xml:12252
15890 "By stopping the flow of HIV treatment into Africa, the United States "
15891 "government was not saving drugs for United States citizens. This is not "
15892 "like wheat (if they eat it, we can't); instead, the flow that the United "
15893 "States intervened to stop was, in effect, a flow of knowledge: information "
15894 "about how to take chemicals that exist within Africa, and turn those "
15895 "chemicals into drugs that would save 15 to 30 million lives."
15898 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15899 #: freeculture.xml:12260
15901 "Nor was the intervention by the United States going to protect the profits "
15902 "of United States drug companies—at least, not substantially. It was "
15903 "not as if these countries were in the position to buy the drugs for the "
15904 "prices the drug companies were charging. Again, the Africans are wildly too "
15905 "poor to afford these drugs at the offered prices. Stopping the parallel "
15906 "import of these drugs would not substantially increase the sales by "
15912 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
15913 #: freeculture.xml:12275
15915 "See Sabin Russell, \"New Crusade to Lower AIDS Drug Costs: Africa's Needs at "
15916 "Odds with Firms' Profit Motive,\" <citetitle>San Francisco "
15917 "Chronicle</citetitle>, 24 May 1999, A1, available at <ulink "
15918 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #57</ulink> (\"compulsory "
15919 "licenses and gray markets pose a threat to the entire system of intellectual "
15920 "property protection\"); Robert Weissman, \"AIDS and Developing Countries: "
15921 "Democratizing Access to Essential Medicines,\" <citetitle>Foreign Policy in "
15922 "Focus</citetitle> 4:23 (August 1999), available at <ulink "
15923 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #58</ulink> (describing "
15924 "U.S. policy); John A. Harrelson, \"TRIPS, Pharmaceutical Patents, and the "
15925 "HIV/AIDS Crisis: Finding the Proper Balance Between Intellectual Property "
15926 "Rights and Compassion, a Synopsis,\" <citetitle>Widener Law Symposium "
15927 "Journal</citetitle> (Spring 2001): 175."
15930 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15931 #: freeculture.xml:12269
15933 "Instead, the argument in favor of restricting this flow of information, "
15934 "which was needed to save the lives of millions, was an argument about the "
15935 "sanctity of property.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> It was "
15936 "because \"intellectual property\" would be violated that these drugs should "
15937 "not flow into Africa. It was a principle about the importance of "
15938 "\"intellectual property\" that led these government actors to intervene "
15939 "against the South African response to AIDS."
15942 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15943 #: freeculture.xml:12296
15945 "Now just step back for a moment. There will be a time thirty years from now "
15946 "when our children look back at us and ask, how could we have let this "
15947 "happen? How could we allow a policy to be pursued whose direct cost would be "
15948 "to speed the death of 15 to 30 million Africans, and whose only real benefit "
15949 "would be to uphold the \"sanctity\" of an idea? What possible justification "
15950 "could there ever be for a policy that results in so many deaths? What "
15951 "exactly is the insanity that would allow so many to die for such an "
15955 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15956 #: freeculture.xml:12306
15958 "Some blame the drug companies. I don't. They are corporations. Their "
15959 "managers are ordered by law to make money for the corporation. They push a "
15960 "certain patent policy not because of ideals, but because it is the policy "
15961 "that makes them the most money. And it only makes them the most money "
15962 "because of a certain corruption within our political system— a "
15963 "corruption the drug companies are certainly not responsible for."
15966 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15967 #: freeculture.xml:12314
15969 "The corruption is our own politicians' failure of integrity. For the drug "
15970 "companies would love—they say, and I believe them—to sell their "
15971 "drugs as cheaply as they can to countries in Africa and elsewhere. There "
15972 "are issues they'd have to resolve to make sure the drugs didn't get back "
15973 "into the United States, but those are mere problems of technology. They "
15974 "could be overcome."
15978 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15979 #: freeculture.xml:12322
15981 "A different problem, however, could not be overcome. This is the fear of the "
15982 "grandstanding politician who would call the presidents of the drug companies "
15983 "before a Senate or House hearing, and ask, \"How is it you can sell this HIV "
15984 "drug in Africa for only $1 a pill, but the same drug would cost an American "
15985 "$1,500?\" Because there is no \"sound bite\" answer to that question, its "
15986 "effect would be to induce regulation of prices in America. The drug "
15987 "companies thus avoid this spiral by avoiding the first step. They reinforce "
15988 "the idea that property should be sacred. They adopt a rational strategy in "
15989 "an irrational context, with the unintended consequence that perhaps millions "
15990 "die. And that rational strategy thus becomes framed in terms of this "
15991 "ideal—the sanctity of an idea called \"intellectual property.\""
15994 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
15995 #: freeculture.xml:12337
15997 "So when the common sense of your child confronts you, what will you say? "
15998 "When the common sense of a generation finally revolts against what we have "
15999 "done, how will we justify what we have done? What is the argument?"
16002 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16003 #: freeculture.xml:12343
16005 "A sensible patent policy could endorse and strongly support the patent "
16006 "system without having to reach everyone everywhere in exactly the same "
16007 "way. Just as a sensible copyright policy could endorse and strongly support "
16008 "a copyright system without having to regulate the spread of culture "
16009 "perfectly and forever, a sensible patent policy could endorse and strongly "
16010 "support a patent system without having to block the spread of drugs to a "
16011 "country not rich enough to afford market prices in any case. A sensible "
16012 "policy, in other words, could be a balanced policy. For most of our history, "
16013 "both copyright and patent policies were balanced in just this sense."
16017 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16018 #: freeculture.xml:12355
16020 "But we as a culture have lost this sense of balance. We have lost the "
16021 "critical eye that helps us see the difference between truth and extremism. "
16022 "A certain property fundamentalism, having no connection to our tradition, "
16023 "now reigns in this culture—bizarrely, and with consequences more grave "
16024 "to the spread of ideas and culture than almost any other single policy "
16025 "decision that we as a democracy will make. A simple idea blinds us, and "
16026 "under the cover of darkness, much happens that most of us would reject if "
16027 "any of us looked. So uncritically do we accept the idea of property in ideas "
16028 "that we don't even notice how monstrous it is to deny ideas to a people who "
16029 "are dying without them. So uncritically do we accept the idea of property in "
16030 "culture that we don't even question when the control of that property "
16031 "removes our ability, as a people, to develop our culture "
16032 "democratically. Blindness becomes our common sense. And the challenge for "
16033 "anyone who would reclaim the right to cultivate our culture is to find a way "
16034 "to make this common sense open its eyes."
16037 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16038 #: freeculture.xml:12375
16040 "So far, common sense sleeps. There is no revolt. Common sense does not yet "
16041 "see what there could be to revolt about. The extremism that now dominates "
16042 "this debate fits with ideas that seem natural, and that fit is reinforced by "
16043 "the RCAs of our day. They wage a frantic war to fight \"piracy,\" and "
16044 "devastate a culture for creativity. They defend the idea of \"creative "
16045 "property,\" while transforming real creators into modern-day "
16046 "sharecroppers. They are insulted by the idea that rights should be balanced, "
16047 "even though each of the major players in this content war was itself a "
16048 "beneficiary of a more balanced ideal. The hypocrisy reeks. Yet in a city "
16049 "like Washington, hypocrisy is not even noticed. Powerful lobbies, complex "
16050 "issues, and MTV attention spans produce the \"perfect storm\" for free "
16055 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
16056 #: freeculture.xml:12392
16058 "Jonathan Krim, \"The Quiet War over Open-Source,\" <citetitle>Washington "
16059 "Post</citetitle>, August 2003, E1, available at <ulink "
16060 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #59</ulink>; William New, "
16061 "\"Global Group's Shift on `Open Source' Meeting Spurs Stir,\" "
16062 "<citetitle>National Journal's Technology Daily</citetitle>, 19 August 2003, "
16063 "available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #60</ulink>; "
16064 "William New, \"U.S. Official Opposes `Open Source' Talks at WIPO,\" "
16065 "<citetitle>National Journal's Technology Daily</citetitle>, 19 August 2003, "
16066 "available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #61</ulink>."
16069 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><indexterm><primary>
16070 #: freeculture.xml:12420 freeculture.xml:13147
16071 msgid "PLoS (Public Library of Science)"
16074 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16075 #: freeculture.xml:12389
16077 "In August 2003, a fight broke out in the United States about a decision by "
16078 "the World Intellectual Property Organization to cancel a "
16079 "meeting.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> At the request of a wide "
16080 "range of interests, WIPO had decided to hold a meeting to discuss \"open and "
16081 "collaborative projects to create public goods.\" These are projects that "
16082 "have been successful in producing public goods without relying exclusively "
16083 "upon a proprietary use of intellectual property. Examples include the "
16084 "Internet and the World Wide Web, both of which were developed on the basis "
16085 "of protocols in the public domain. It included an emerging trend to support "
16086 "open academic journals, including the Public Library of Science project that "
16087 "I describe in the Afterword. It included a project to develop single "
16088 "nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), which are thought to have great "
16089 "significance in biomedical research. (That nonprofit project comprised a "
16090 "consortium of the Wellcome Trust and pharmaceutical and technological "
16091 "companies, including Amersham Biosciences, AstraZeneca, Aventis, Bayer, "
16092 "Bristol-Myers Squibb, Hoffmann-La Roche, Glaxo-SmithKline, IBM, Motorola, "
16093 "Novartis, Pfizer, and Searle.) It included the Global Positioning System, "
16094 "which Ronald Reagan set free in the early 1980s. And it included \"open "
16095 "source and free software.\" <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
16098 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16099 #: freeculture.xml:12423
16101 "The aim of the meeting was to consider this wide range of projects from one "
16102 "common perspective: that none of these projects relied upon intellectual "
16103 "property extremism. Instead, in all of them, intellectual property was "
16104 "balanced by agreements to keep access open or to impose limitations on the "
16105 "way in which proprietary claims might be used."
16109 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
16110 #: freeculture.xml:12431
16112 "I should disclose that I was one of the people who asked WIPO for the "
16116 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16117 #: freeculture.xml:12430
16119 "From the perspective of this book, then, the conference was "
16120 "ideal.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The projects within its "
16121 "scope included both commercial and noncommercial work. They primarily "
16122 "involved science, but from many perspectives. And WIPO was an ideal venue "
16123 "for this discussion, since WIPO is the preeminent international body dealing "
16124 "with intellectual property issues."
16128 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16129 #: freeculture.xml:12441
16131 "Indeed, I was once publicly scolded for not recognizing this fact about "
16132 "WIPO. In February 2003, I delivered a keynote address to a preparatory "
16133 "conference for the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). At a "
16134 "press conference before the address, I was asked what I would say. I "
16135 "responded that I would be talking a little about the importance of balance "
16136 "in intellectual property for the development of an information society. The "
16137 "moderator for the event then promptly interrupted to inform me and the "
16138 "assembled reporters that no question about intellectual property would be "
16139 "discussed by WSIS, since those questions were the exclusive domain of "
16140 "WIPO. In the talk that I had prepared, I had actually made the issue of "
16141 "intellectual property relatively minor. But after this astonishing "
16142 "statement, I made intellectual property the sole focus of my talk. There was "
16143 "no way to talk about an \"Information Society\" unless one also talked about "
16144 "the range of information and culture that would be free. My talk did not "
16145 "make my immoderate moderator very happy. And she was no doubt correct that "
16146 "the scope of intellectual property protections was ordinarily the stuff of "
16147 "WIPO. But in my view, there couldn't be too much of a conversation about how "
16148 "much intellectual property is needed, since in my view, the very idea of "
16149 "balance in intellectual property had been lost."
16152 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16153 #: freeculture.xml:12465
16155 "So whether or not WSIS can discuss balance in intellectual property, I had "
16156 "thought it was taken for granted that WIPO could and should. And thus the "
16157 "meeting about \"open and collaborative projects to create public goods\" "
16158 "seemed perfectly appropriate within the WIPO agenda."
16161 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16162 #: freeculture.xml:12471
16164 "But there is one project within that list that is highly controversial, at "
16165 "least among lobbyists. That project is \"open source and free software.\" "
16166 "Microsoft in particular is wary of discussion of the subject. From its "
16167 "perspective, a conference to discuss open source and free software would be "
16168 "like a conference to discuss Apple's operating system. Both open source and "
16169 "free software compete with Microsoft's software. And internationally, many "
16170 "governments have begun to explore requirements that they use open source or "
16171 "free software, rather than \"proprietary software,\" for their own internal "
16176 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
16177 #: freeculture.xml:12493
16179 "Microsoft's position about free and open source software is more "
16180 "sophisticated. As it has repeatedly asserted, it has no problem with \"open "
16181 "source\" software or software in the public domain. Microsoft's principal "
16182 "opposition is to \"free software\" licensed under a \"copyleft\" license, "
16183 "meaning a license that requires the licensee to adopt the same terms on any "
16184 "derivative work. See Bradford L. Smith, \"The Future of Software: Enabling "
16185 "the Marketplace to Decide,\" <citetitle>Government Policy Toward Open Source "
16186 "Software</citetitle> (Washington, D.C.: AEI-Brookings Joint Center for "
16187 "Regulatory Studies, American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy "
16188 "Research, 2002), 69, available at <ulink "
16189 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #62</ulink>. See also Craig "
16190 "Mundie, Microsoft senior vice president, <citetitle>The Commercial Software "
16191 "Model</citetitle>, discussion at New York University Stern School of "
16192 "Business (3 May 2001), available at <ulink "
16193 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #63</ulink>."
16196 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16197 #: freeculture.xml:12482
16199 "I don't mean to enter that debate here. It is important only to make clear "
16200 "that the distinction is not between commercial and noncommercial "
16201 "software. There are many important companies that depend fundamentally upon "
16202 "open source and free software, IBM being the most prominent. IBM is "
16203 "increasingly shifting its focus to the GNU/Linux operating system, the most "
16204 "famous bit of \"free software\"—and IBM is emphatically a commercial "
16205 "entity. Thus, to support \"open source and free software\" is not to oppose "
16206 "commercial entities. It is, instead, to support a mode of software "
16207 "development that is different from Microsoft's.<placeholder "
16208 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
16212 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16213 #: freeculture.xml:12512
16215 "More important for our purposes, to support \"open source and free "
16216 "software\" is not to oppose copyright. \"Open source and free software\" is "
16217 "not software in the public domain. Instead, like Microsoft's software, the "
16218 "copyright owners of free and open source software insist quite strongly that "
16219 "the terms of their software license be respected by adopters of free and "
16220 "open source software. The terms of that license are no doubt different from "
16221 "the terms of a proprietary software license. Free software licensed under "
16222 "the General Public License (GPL), for example, requires that the source code "
16223 "for the software be made available by anyone who modifies and redistributes "
16224 "the software. But that requirement is effective only if copyright governs "
16225 "software. If copyright did not govern software, then free software could not "
16226 "impose the same kind of requirements on its adopters. It thus depends upon "
16227 "copyright law just as Microsoft does."
16231 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
16232 #: freeculture.xml:12538
16234 "Krim, \"The Quiet War over Open-Source,\" available at <ulink "
16235 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #64</ulink>."
16238 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16239 #: freeculture.xml:12530
16241 "It is therefore understandable that as a proprietary software developer, "
16242 "Microsoft would oppose this WIPO meeting, and understandable that it would "
16243 "use its lobbyists to get the United States government to oppose it, as "
16244 "well. And indeed, that is just what was reported to have happened. According "
16245 "to Jonathan Krim of the <citetitle>Washington Post</citetitle>, Microsoft's "
16246 "lobbyists succeeded in getting the United States government to veto the "
16247 "meeting.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> And without U.S. backing, "
16248 "the meeting was canceled."
16251 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16252 #: freeculture.xml:12544
16254 "I don't blame Microsoft for doing what it can to advance its own interests, "
16255 "consistent with the law. And lobbying governments is plainly consistent with "
16256 "the law. There was nothing surprising about its lobbying here, and nothing "
16257 "terribly surprising about the most powerful software producer in the United "
16258 "States having succeeded in its lobbying efforts."
16261 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16262 #: freeculture.xml:12552
16264 "What was surprising was the United States government's reason for opposing "
16265 "the meeting. Again, as reported by Krim, Lois Boland, acting director of "
16266 "international relations for the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, explained "
16267 "that \"open-source software runs counter to the mission of WIPO, which is to "
16268 "promote intellectual-property rights.\" She is quoted as saying, \"To hold a "
16269 "meeting which has as its purpose to disclaim or waive such rights seems to "
16270 "us to be contrary to the goals of WIPO.\""
16273 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16274 #: freeculture.xml:12562
16275 msgid "These statements are astonishing on a number of levels."
16278 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16279 #: freeculture.xml:12566
16281 "First, they are just flat wrong. As I described, most open source and free "
16282 "software relies fundamentally upon the intellectual property right called "
16283 "\"copyright\". Without it, restrictions imposed by those licenses wouldn't "
16284 "work. Thus, to say it \"runs counter\" to the mission of promoting "
16285 "intellectual property rights reveals an extraordinary gap in "
16286 "understanding—the sort of mistake that is excusable in a first-year "
16287 "law student, but an embarrassment from a high government official dealing "
16288 "with intellectual property issues."
16291 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16292 #: freeculture.xml:12576
16294 "Second, who ever said that WIPO's exclusive aim was to \"promote\" "
16295 "intellectual property maximally? As I had been scolded at the preparatory "
16296 "conference of WSIS, WIPO is to consider not only how best to protect "
16297 "intellectual property, but also what the best balance of intellectual "
16298 "property is. As every economist and lawyer knows, the hard question in "
16299 "intellectual property law is to find that balance. But that there should be "
16300 "limits is, I had thought, uncontested. One wants to ask Ms. Boland, are "
16301 "generic drugs (drugs based on drugs whose patent has expired) contrary to "
16302 "the WIPO mission? Does the public domain weaken intellectual property? Would "
16303 "it have been better if the protocols of the Internet had been patented?"
16306 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16307 #: freeculture.xml:12589
16309 "Third, even if one believed that the purpose of WIPO was to maximize "
16310 "intellectual property rights, in our tradition, intellectual property rights "
16311 "are held by individuals and corporations. They get to decide what to do with "
16312 "those rights because, again, they are <emphasis>their</emphasis> rights. If "
16313 "they want to \"waive\" or \"disclaim\" their rights, that is, within our "
16314 "tradition, totally appropriate. When Bill Gates gives away more than $20 "
16315 "billion to do good in the world, that is not inconsistent with the "
16316 "objectives of the property system. That is, on the contrary, just what a "
16317 "property system is supposed to be about: giving individuals the right to "
16318 "decide what to do with <emphasis>their</emphasis> property. <placeholder "
16319 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
16323 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16324 #: freeculture.xml:12603
16326 "When Ms. Boland says that there is something wrong with a meeting \"which "
16327 "has as its purpose to disclaim or waive such rights,\" she's saying that "
16328 "WIPO has an interest in interfering with the choices of the individuals who "
16329 "own intellectual property rights. That somehow, WIPO's objective should be "
16330 "to stop an individual from \"waiving\" or \"disclaiming\" an intellectual "
16331 "property right. That the interest of WIPO is not just that intellectual "
16332 "property rights be maximized, but that they also should be exercised in the "
16333 "most extreme and restrictive way possible."
16336 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16337 #: freeculture.xml:12615
16339 "There is a history of just such a property system that is well known in the "
16340 "Anglo-American tradition. It is called \"feudalism.\" Under feudalism, not "
16341 "only was property held by a relatively small number of individuals and "
16342 "entities. And not only were the rights that ran with that property powerful "
16343 "and extensive. But the feudal system had a strong interest in assuring that "
16344 "property holders within that system not weaken feudalism by liberating "
16345 "people or property within their control to the free market. Feudalism "
16346 "depended upon maximum control and concentration. It fought any freedom that "
16347 "might interfere with that control."
16350 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
16351 #: freeculture.xml:12632
16353 "See Drahos with Braithwaite, <citetitle>Information Feudalism</citetitle>, "
16354 "210–20. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
16357 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16358 #: freeculture.xml:12629
16360 "As Peter Drahos and John Braithwaite relate, this is precisely the choice we "
16361 "are now making about intellectual property.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
16362 "id=\"0\"/> We will have an information society. That much is certain. Our "
16363 "only choice now is whether that information society will be "
16364 "<emphasis>free</emphasis> or <emphasis>feudal</emphasis>. The trend is "
16365 "toward the feudal."
16368 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16369 #: freeculture.xml:12641
16371 "When this battle broke, I blogged it. A spirited debate within the comment "
16372 "section ensued. Ms. Boland had a number of supporters who tried to show why "
16373 "her comments made sense. But there was one comment that was particularly "
16374 "depressing for me. An anonymous poster wrote,"
16378 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><blockquote><para>
16379 #: freeculture.xml:12648
16381 "George, you misunderstand Lessig: He's only talking about the world as it "
16382 "should be (\"the goal of WIPO, and the goal of any government, should be to "
16383 "promote the right balance of intellectual property rights, not simply to "
16384 "promote intellectual property rights\"), not as it is. If we were talking "
16385 "about the world as it is, then of course Boland didn't say anything "
16386 "wrong. But in the world as Lessig would have it, then of course she "
16387 "did. Always pay attention to the distinction between Lessig's world and "
16391 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16392 #: freeculture.xml:12660
16394 "I missed the irony the first time I read it. I read it quickly and thought "
16395 "the poster was supporting the idea that seeking balance was what our "
16396 "government should be doing. (Of course, my criticism of Ms. Boland was not "
16397 "about whether she was seeking balance or not; my criticism was that her "
16398 "comments betrayed a first-year law student's mistake. I have no illusion "
16399 "about the extremism of our government, whether Republican or Democrat. My "
16400 "only illusion apparently is about whether our government should speak the "
16404 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16405 #: freeculture.xml:12670
16407 "Obviously, however, the poster was not supporting that idea. Instead, the "
16408 "poster was ridiculing the very idea that in the real world, the \"goal\" of "
16409 "a government should be \"to promote the right balance\" of intellectual "
16410 "property. That was obviously silly to him. And it obviously betrayed, he "
16411 "believed, my own silly utopianism. \"Typical for an academic,\" the poster "
16412 "might well have continued."
16415 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16416 #: freeculture.xml:12678
16418 "I understand criticism of academic utopianism. I think utopianism is silly, "
16419 "too, and I'd be the first to poke fun at the absurdly unrealistic ideals of "
16420 "academics throughout history (and not just in our own country's history)."
16423 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16424 #: freeculture.xml:12684
16426 "But when it has become silly to suppose that the role of our government "
16427 "should be to \"seek balance,\" then count me with the silly, for that means "
16428 "that this has become quite serious indeed. If it should be obvious to "
16429 "everyone that the government does not seek balance, that the government is "
16430 "simply the tool of the most powerful lobbyists, that the idea of holding the "
16431 "government to a different standard is absurd, that the idea of demanding of "
16432 "the government that it speak truth and not lies is just naïve, then who "
16433 "have we, the most powerful democracy in the world, become?"
16437 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16438 #: freeculture.xml:12695
16440 "It might be crazy to expect a high government official to speak the "
16441 "truth. It might be crazy to believe that government policy will be something "
16442 "more than the handmaiden of the most powerful interests. It might be crazy "
16443 "to argue that we should preserve a tradition that has been part of our "
16444 "tradition for most of our history—free culture."
16447 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><indexterm><primary>
16448 #: freeculture.xml:12714
16449 msgid "Turner, Ted"
16452 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16453 #: freeculture.xml:12704
16455 "If this is crazy, then let there be more crazies. Soon. There are moments "
16456 "of hope in this struggle. And moments that surprise. When the FCC was "
16457 "considering relaxing ownership rules, which would thereby further increase "
16458 "the concentration in media ownership, an extraordinary bipartisan coalition "
16459 "formed to fight this change. For perhaps the first time in history, "
16460 "interests as diverse as the NRA, the ACLU, Moveon.org, William Safire, Ted "
16461 "Turner, and CodePink Women for Peace organized to oppose this change in FCC "
16462 "policy. An astonishing 700,000 letters were sent to the FCC, demanding more "
16463 "hearings and a different result. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> "
16464 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
16467 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16468 #: freeculture.xml:12718
16470 "This activism did not stop the FCC, but soon after, a broad coalition in the "
16471 "Senate voted to reverse the FCC decision. The hostile hearings leading up to "
16472 "that vote revealed just how powerful this movement had become. There was no "
16473 "substantial support for the FCC's decision, and there was broad and "
16474 "sustained support for fighting further concentration in the media."
16477 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16478 #: freeculture.xml:12726
16480 "But even this movement misses an important piece of the puzzle. Largeness "
16481 "as such is not bad. Freedom is not threatened just because some become very "
16482 "rich, or because there are only a handful of big players. The poor quality "
16483 "of Big Macs or Quarter Pounders does not mean that you can't get a good "
16484 "hamburger from somewhere else."
16487 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16488 #: freeculture.xml:12733
16490 "The danger in media concentration comes not from the concentration, but "
16491 "instead from the feudalism that this concentration, tied to the change in "
16492 "copyright, produces. It is not just that there are a few powerful companies "
16493 "that control an ever expanding slice of the media. It is that this "
16494 "concentration can call upon an equally bloated range of "
16495 "rights—property rights of a historically extreme form—that makes "
16496 "their bigness bad."
16499 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16500 #: freeculture.xml:12743
16502 "It is therefore significant that so many would rally to demand competition "
16503 "and increased diversity. Still, if the rally is understood as being about "
16504 "bigness alone, it is not terribly surprising. We Americans have a long "
16505 "history of fighting \"big,\" wisely or not. That we could be motivated to "
16506 "fight \"big\" again is not something new."
16509 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16510 #: freeculture.xml:12750
16512 "It would be something new, and something very important, if an equal number "
16513 "could be rallied to fight the increasing extremism built within the idea of "
16514 "\"intellectual property.\" Not because balance is alien to our tradition; "
16515 "indeed, as I've argued, balance is our tradition. But because the muscle to "
16516 "think critically about the scope of anything called \"property\" is not well "
16517 "exercised within this tradition anymore."
16520 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16521 #: freeculture.xml:12758
16523 "If we were Achilles, this would be our heel. This would be the place of our "
16527 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><indexterm><primary>
16528 #: freeculture.xml:12761
16533 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
16534 #: freeculture.xml:12766
16536 "John Borland, \"RIAA Sues 261 File Swappers,\" CNET News.com, September "
16537 "2003, available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
16538 "#65</ulink>; Paul R. La Monica, \"Music Industry Sues Swappers,\" CNN/Money, "
16539 "8 September 2003, available at <ulink "
16540 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #66</ulink>; Soni Sangha and "
16541 "Phyllis Furman with Robert Gearty, \"Sued for a Song, N.Y.C. 12-Yr-Old Among "
16542 "261 Cited as Sharers,\" <citetitle>New York Daily News</citetitle>, 9 "
16543 "September 2003, 3; Frank Ahrens, \"RIAA's Lawsuits Meet Surprised Targets; "
16544 "Single Mother in Calif., 12-Year-Old Girl in N.Y. Among Defendants,\" "
16545 "<citetitle>Washington Post</citetitle>, 10 September 2003, E1; Katie Dean, "
16546 "\"Schoolgirl Settles with RIAA,\" <citetitle>Wired News</citetitle>, 10 "
16547 "September 2003, available at <ulink "
16548 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #67</ulink>."
16552 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
16553 #: freeculture.xml:12784
16555 "Jon Wiederhorn, \"Eminem Gets Sued . . . by a Little Old Lady,\" mtv.com, 17 "
16556 "September 2003, available at <ulink "
16557 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #68</ulink>."
16562 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
16563 #: freeculture.xml:12791
16565 "Kenji Hall, Associated Press, \"Japanese Book May Be Inspiration for Dylan "
16566 "Songs,\" Kansascity.com, 9 July 2003, available at <ulink "
16567 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #69</ulink>."
16570 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16571 #: freeculture.xml:12763
16573 "As I write these final words, the news is filled with stories about the RIAA "
16574 "lawsuits against almost three hundred individuals.<placeholder "
16575 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> Eminem has just been sued for \"sampling\" "
16576 "someone else's music.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> The story "
16577 "about Bob Dylan \"stealing\" from a Japanese author has just finished making "
16578 "the rounds.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"2\"/> An insider from "
16579 "Hollywood—who insists he must remain anonymous—reports \"an "
16580 "amazing conversation with these studio guys. They've got extraordinary [old] "
16581 "content that they'd love to use but can't because they can't begin to clear "
16582 "the rights. They've got scores of kids who could do amazing things with the "
16583 "content, but it would take scores of lawyers to clean it first.\" "
16584 "Congressmen are talking about deputizing computer viruses to bring down "
16585 "computers thought to violate the law. Universities are threatening expulsion "
16586 "for kids who use a computer to share content."
16589 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><indexterm><primary>
16590 #: freeculture.xml:12808 freeculture.xml:13163
16591 msgid "Creative Commons"
16594 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><indexterm><primary>
16595 #: freeculture.xml:12809
16596 msgid "Gil, Gilberto"
16600 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
16601 #: freeculture.xml:12814
16603 "\"BBC Plans to Open Up Its Archive to the Public,\" BBC press release, 24 "
16604 "August 2003, available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
16609 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para><footnote><para>
16610 #: freeculture.xml:12823
16612 "\"Creative Commons and Brazil,\" Creative Commons Weblog, 6 August 2003, "
16613 "available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #71</ulink>."
16617 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16618 #: freeculture.xml:12811
16620 "Yet on the other side of the Atlantic, the BBC has just announced that it "
16621 "will build a \"Creative Archive,\" from which British citizens can download "
16622 "BBC content, and rip, mix, and burn it.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
16623 "id=\"0\"/> And in Brazil, the culture minister, Gilberto Gil, himself a folk "
16624 "hero of Brazilian music, has joined with Creative Commons to release content "
16625 "and free licenses in that Latin American country.<placeholder "
16626 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"1\"/> I've told a dark story. The truth is more "
16627 "mixed. A technology has given us a new freedom. Slowly, some begin to "
16628 "understand that this freedom need not mean anarchy. We can carry a free "
16629 "culture into the twenty-first century, without artists losing and without "
16630 "the potential of digital technology being destroyed. It will take some "
16631 "thought, and more importantly, it will take some will to transform the RCAs "
16632 "of our day into the Causbys."
16636 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16637 #: freeculture.xml:12837
16639 "Common sense must revolt. It must act to free culture. Soon, if this "
16640 "potential is ever to be realized."
16643 #. type: Content of: <book><part><title>
16644 #: freeculture.xml:12847
16649 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16650 #: freeculture.xml:12852
16652 "At least some who have read this far will agree with me that something must "
16653 "be done to change where we are heading. The balance of this book maps what "
16657 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16658 #: freeculture.xml:12857
16660 "I divide this map into two parts: that which anyone can do now, and that "
16661 "which requires the help of lawmakers. If there is one lesson that we can "
16662 "draw from the history of remaking common sense, it is that it requires "
16663 "remaking how many people think about the very same issue."
16666 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16667 #: freeculture.xml:12863
16669 "That means this movement must begin in the streets. It must recruit a "
16670 "significant number of parents, teachers, librarians, creators, authors, "
16671 "musicians, filmmakers, scientists—all to tell this story in their own "
16672 "words, and to tell their neighbors why this battle is so important."
16675 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><para>
16676 #: freeculture.xml:12870
16678 "Once this movement has its effect in the streets, it has some hope of having "
16679 "an effect in Washington. We are still a democracy. What people think "
16680 "matters. Not as much as it should, at least when an RCA stands opposed, but "
16681 "still, it matters. And thus, in the second part below, I sketch changes that "
16682 "Congress could make to better secure a free culture."
16685 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><title>
16686 #: freeculture.xml:12879
16690 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><para>
16691 #: freeculture.xml:12881
16693 "Common sense is with the copyright warriors because the debate so far has "
16694 "been framed at the extremes—as a grand either/or: either property or "
16695 "anarchy, either total control or artists won't be paid. If that really is "
16696 "the choice, then the warriors should win."
16699 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><para>
16700 #: freeculture.xml:12887
16702 "The mistake here is the error of the excluded middle. There are extremes in "
16703 "this debate, but the extremes are not all that there is. There are those who "
16704 "believe in maximal copyright—\"All Rights Reserved\"— and those "
16705 "who reject copyright—\"No Rights Reserved.\" The \"All Rights "
16706 "Reserved\" sorts believe that you should ask permission before you \"use\" a "
16707 "copyrighted work in any way. The \"No Rights Reserved\" sorts believe you "
16708 "should be able to do with content as you wish, regardless of whether you "
16709 "have permission or not."
16713 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><para>
16714 #: freeculture.xml:12897
16716 "When the Internet was first born, its initial architecture effectively "
16717 "tilted in the \"no rights reserved\" direction. Content could be copied "
16718 "perfectly and cheaply; rights could not easily be controlled. Thus, "
16719 "regardless of anyone's desire, the effective regime of copyright under the "
16720 "original design of the Internet was \"no rights reserved.\" Content was "
16721 "\"taken\" regardless of the rights. Any rights were effectively unprotected."
16724 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><para>
16725 #: freeculture.xml:12909
16727 "This initial character produced a reaction (opposite, but not quite equal) "
16728 "by copyright owners. That reaction has been the topic of this book. Through "
16729 "legislation, litigation, and changes to the network's design, copyright "
16730 "holders have been able to change the essential character of the environment "
16731 "of the original Internet. If the original architecture made the effective "
16732 "default \"no rights reserved,\" the future architecture will make the "
16733 "effective default \"all rights reserved.\" The architecture and law that "
16734 "surround the Internet's design will increasingly produce an environment "
16735 "where all use of content requires permission. The \"cut and paste\" world "
16736 "that defines the Internet today will become a \"get permission to cut and "
16737 "paste\" world that is a creator's nightmare."
16740 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><para>
16741 #: freeculture.xml:12923
16743 "What's needed is a way to say something in the middle—neither \"all "
16744 "rights reserved\" nor \"no rights reserved\" but \"some rights "
16745 "reserved\"— and thus a way to respect copyrights but enable creators "
16746 "to free content as they see fit. In other words, we need a way to restore a "
16747 "set of freedoms that we could just take for granted before."
16750 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><title>
16751 #: freeculture.xml:12932
16752 msgid "Rebuilding Freedoms Previously Presumed: Examples"
16755 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16756 #: freeculture.xml:12934
16758 "If you step back from the battle I've been describing here, you will "
16759 "recognize this problem from other contexts. Think about privacy. Before the "
16760 "Internet, most of us didn't have to worry much about data about our lives "
16761 "that we broadcast to the world. If you walked into a bookstore and browsed "
16762 "through some of the works of Karl Marx, you didn't need to worry about "
16763 "explaining your browsing habits to your neighbors or boss. The \"privacy\" "
16764 "of your browsing habits was assured."
16767 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16768 #: freeculture.xml:12944
16769 msgid "What made it assured?"
16772 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16773 #: freeculture.xml:12948
16775 "Well, if we think in terms of the modalities I described in chapter 10, your "
16776 "privacy was assured because of an inefficient architecture for gathering "
16777 "data and hence a market constraint (cost) on anyone who wanted to gather "
16778 "that data. If you were a suspected spy for North Korea, working for the CIA, "
16779 "no doubt your privacy would not be assured. But that's because the CIA "
16780 "would (we hope) find it valuable enough to spend the thousands required to "
16781 "track you. But for most of us (again, we can hope), spying doesn't pay. The "
16782 "highly inefficient architecture of real space means we all enjoy a fairly "
16783 "robust amount of privacy. That privacy is guaranteed to us by friction. Not "
16784 "by law (there is no law protecting \"privacy\" in public places), and in "
16785 "many places, not by norms (snooping and gossip are just fun), but instead, "
16786 "by the costs that friction imposes on anyone who would want to spy."
16789 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><indexterm><primary>
16790 #: freeculture.xml:12962
16794 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16795 #: freeculture.xml:12964
16797 "Enter the Internet, where the cost of tracking browsing in particular has "
16798 "become quite tiny. If you're a customer at Amazon, then as you browse the "
16799 "pages, Amazon collects the data about what you've looked at. You know this "
16800 "because at the side of the page, there's a list of \"recently viewed\" "
16801 "pages. Now, because of the architecture of the Net and the function of "
16802 "cookies on the Net, it is easier to collect the data than not. The friction "
16803 "has disappeared, and hence any \"privacy\" protected by the friction "
16807 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16808 #: freeculture.xml:12974
16810 "Amazon, of course, is not the problem. But we might begin to worry about "
16811 "libraries. If you're one of those crazy lefties who thinks that people "
16812 "should have the \"right\" to browse in a library without the government "
16813 "knowing which books you look at (I'm one of those lefties, too), then this "
16814 "change in the technology of monitoring might concern you. If it becomes "
16815 "simple to gather and sort who does what in electronic spaces, then the "
16816 "friction-induced privacy of yesterday disappears."
16820 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para>
16821 #: freeculture.xml:12990
16823 "See, for example, Marc Rotenberg, \"Fair Information Practices and the "
16824 "Architecture of Privacy (What Larry Doesn't Get),\" <citetitle>Stanford "
16825 "Technology Law Review</citetitle> 1 (2001): par. 6–18, available at "
16826 "<ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #72</ulink> (describing "
16827 "examples in which technology defines privacy policy). See also Jeffrey "
16828 "Rosen, <citetitle>The Naked Crowd: Reclaiming Security and Freedom in an "
16829 "Anxious Age</citetitle> (New York: Random House, 2004) (mapping tradeoffs "
16830 "between technology and privacy)."
16834 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16835 #: freeculture.xml:12984
16837 "It is this reality that explains the push of many to define \"privacy\" on "
16838 "the Internet. It is the recognition that technology can remove what friction "
16839 "before gave us that leads many to push for laws to do what friction "
16840 "did.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> And whether you're in favor of "
16841 "those laws or not, it is the pattern that is important here. We must take "
16842 "affirmative steps to secure a kind of freedom that was passively provided "
16843 "before. A change in technology now forces those who believe in privacy to "
16844 "affirmatively act where, before, privacy was given by default."
16847 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16848 #: freeculture.xml:13008
16850 "A similar story could be told about the birth of the free software "
16851 "movement. When computers with software were first made available "
16852 "commercially, the software—both the source code and the "
16853 "binaries— was free. You couldn't run a program written for a Data "
16854 "General machine on an IBM machine, so Data General and IBM didn't care much "
16855 "about controlling their software."
16858 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><indexterm><primary>
16859 #: freeculture.xml:13015
16860 msgid "Stallman, Richard"
16863 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16864 #: freeculture.xml:13017
16866 "That was the world Richard Stallman was born into, and while he was a "
16867 "researcher at MIT, he grew to love the community that developed when one was "
16868 "free to explore and tinker with the software that ran on machines. Being a "
16869 "smart sort himself, and a talented programmer, Stallman grew to depend upon "
16870 "the freedom to add to or modify other people's work."
16873 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16874 #: freeculture.xml:13025
16876 "In an academic setting, at least, that's not a terribly radical idea. In a "
16877 "math department, anyone would be free to tinker with a proof that someone "
16878 "offered. If you thought you had a better way to prove a theorem, you could "
16879 "take what someone else did and change it. In a classics department, if you "
16880 "believed a colleague's translation of a recently discovered text was flawed, "
16881 "you were free to improve it. Thus, to Stallman, it seemed obvious that you "
16882 "should be free to tinker with and improve the code that ran a machine. This, "
16883 "too, was knowledge. Why shouldn't it be open for criticism like anything "
16887 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16888 #: freeculture.xml:13037
16890 "No one answered that question. Instead, the architecture of revenue for "
16891 "computing changed. As it became possible to import programs from one system "
16892 "to another, it became economically attractive (at least in the view of some) "
16893 "to hide the code of your program. So, too, as companies started selling "
16894 "peripherals for mainframe systems. If I could just take your printer driver "
16895 "and copy it, then that would make it easier for me to sell a printer to the "
16896 "market than it was for you."
16900 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16901 #: freeculture.xml:13046
16903 "Thus, the practice of proprietary code began to spread, and by the early "
16904 "1980s, Stallman found himself surrounded by proprietary code. The world of "
16905 "free software had been erased by a change in the economics of computing. And "
16906 "as he believed, if he did nothing about it, then the freedom to change and "
16907 "share software would be fundamentally weakened."
16910 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16911 #: freeculture.xml:13055
16913 "Therefore, in 1984, Stallman began a project to build a free operating "
16914 "system, so that at least a strain of free software would survive. That was "
16915 "the birth of the GNU project, into which Linus Torvalds's \"Linux\" kernel "
16916 "was added to produce the GNU/Linux operating system. <placeholder "
16917 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
16920 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16921 #: freeculture.xml:13062
16923 "Stallman's technique was to use copyright law to build a world of software "
16924 "that must be kept free. Software licensed under the Free Software "
16925 "Foundation's GPL cannot be modified and distributed unless the source code "
16926 "for that software is made available as well. Thus, anyone building upon "
16927 "GPL'd software would have to make their buildings free as well. This would "
16928 "assure, Stallman believed, that an ecology of code would develop that "
16929 "remained free for others to build upon. His fundamental goal was freedom; "
16930 "innovative creative code was a byproduct."
16933 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16934 #: freeculture.xml:13073
16936 "Stallman was thus doing for software what privacy advocates now do for "
16937 "privacy. He was seeking a way to rebuild a kind of freedom that was taken "
16938 "for granted before. Through the affirmative use of licenses that bind "
16939 "copyrighted code, Stallman was affirmatively reclaiming a space where free "
16940 "software would survive. He was actively protecting what before had been "
16941 "passively guaranteed."
16944 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16945 #: freeculture.xml:13081
16947 "Finally, consider a very recent example that more directly resonates with "
16948 "the story of this book. This is the shift in the way academic and scientific "
16949 "journals are produced."
16953 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16954 #: freeculture.xml:13086
16956 "As digital technologies develop, it is becoming obvious to many that "
16957 "printing thousands of copies of journals every month and sending them to "
16958 "libraries is perhaps not the most efficient way to distribute "
16959 "knowledge. Instead, journals are increasingly becoming electronic, and "
16960 "libraries and their users are given access to these electronic journals "
16961 "through password-protected sites. Something similar to this has been "
16962 "happening in law for almost thirty years: Lexis and Westlaw have had "
16963 "electronic versions of case reports available to subscribers to their "
16964 "service. Although a Supreme Court opinion is not copyrighted, and anyone is "
16965 "free to go to a library and read it, Lexis and Westlaw are also free to "
16966 "charge users for the privilege of gaining access to that Supreme Court "
16967 "opinion through their respective services."
16970 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16971 #: freeculture.xml:13102
16973 "There's nothing wrong in general with this, and indeed, the ability to "
16974 "charge for access to even public domain materials is a good incentive for "
16975 "people to develop new and innovative ways to spread knowledge. The law has "
16976 "agreed, which is why Lexis and Westlaw have been allowed to flourish. And if "
16977 "there's nothing wrong with selling the public domain, then there could be "
16978 "nothing wrong, in principle, with selling access to material that is not in "
16979 "the public domain."
16982 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16983 #: freeculture.xml:13111
16985 "But what if the only way to get access to social and scientific data was "
16986 "through proprietary services? What if no one had the ability to browse this "
16987 "data except by paying for a subscription?"
16990 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
16991 #: freeculture.xml:13116
16993 "As many are beginning to notice, this is increasingly the reality with "
16994 "scientific journals. When these journals were distributed in paper form, "
16995 "libraries could make the journals available to anyone who had access to the "
16996 "library. Thus, patients with cancer could become cancer experts because the "
16997 "library gave them access. Or patients trying to understand the risks of a "
16998 "certain treatment could research those risks by reading all available "
16999 "articles about that treatment. This freedom was therefore a function of the "
17000 "institution of libraries (norms) and the technology of paper journals "
17001 "(architecture)—namely, that it was very hard to control access to a "
17005 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17006 #: freeculture.xml:13128
17008 "As journals become electronic, however, the publishers are demanding that "
17009 "libraries not give the general public access to the journals. This means "
17010 "that the freedoms provided by print journals in public libraries begin to "
17011 "disappear. Thus, as with privacy and with software, a changing technology "
17012 "and market shrink a freedom taken for granted before."
17015 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17016 #: freeculture.xml:13136
17018 "This shrinking freedom has led many to take affirmative steps to restore the "
17019 "freedom that has been lost. The Public Library of Science (PLoS), for "
17020 "example, is a nonprofit corporation dedicated to making scientific research "
17021 "available to anyone with a Web connection. Authors of scientific work submit "
17022 "that work to the Public Library of Science. That work is then subject to "
17023 "peer review. If accepted, the work is then deposited in a public, electronic "
17024 "archive and made permanently available for free. PLoS also sells a print "
17025 "version of its work, but the copyright for the print journal does not "
17026 "inhibit the right of anyone to redistribute the work for free. <placeholder "
17027 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
17030 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17031 #: freeculture.xml:13150
17033 "This is one of many such efforts to restore a freedom taken for granted "
17034 "before, but now threatened by changing technology and markets. There's no "
17035 "doubt that this alternative competes with the traditional publishers and "
17036 "their efforts to make money from the exclusive distribution of content. But "
17037 "competition in our tradition is presumptively a good—especially when "
17038 "it helps spread knowledge and science."
17041 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><title>
17042 #: freeculture.xml:13161
17043 msgid "Rebuilding Free Culture: One Idea"
17046 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17047 #: freeculture.xml:13166
17049 "The same strategy could be applied to culture, as a response to the "
17050 "increasing control effected through law and technology."
17053 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17054 #: freeculture.xml:13170
17056 "Enter the Creative Commons. The Creative Commons is a nonprofit corporation "
17057 "established in Massachusetts, but with its home at Stanford University. Its "
17058 "aim is to build a layer of <emphasis>reasonable</emphasis> copyright on top "
17059 "of the extremes that now reign. It does this by making it easy for people to "
17060 "build upon other people's work, by making it simple for creators to express "
17061 "the freedom for others to take and build upon their work. Simple tags, tied "
17062 "to human-readable descriptions, tied to bulletproof licenses, make this "
17067 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17068 #: freeculture.xml:13181
17070 "<emphasis>Simple</emphasis>—which means without a middleman, or "
17071 "without a lawyer. By developing a free set of licenses that people can "
17072 "attach to their content, Creative Commons aims to mark a range of content "
17073 "that can easily, and reliably, be built upon. These tags are then linked to "
17074 "machine-readable versions of the license that enable computers automatically "
17075 "to identify content that can easily be shared. These three expressions "
17076 "together—a legal license, a human-readable description, and "
17077 "machine-readable tags—constitute a Creative Commons license. A "
17078 "Creative Commons license constitutes a grant of freedom to anyone who "
17079 "accesses the license, and more importantly, an expression of the ideal that "
17080 "the person associated with the license believes in something different than "
17081 "the \"All\" or \"No\" extremes. Content is marked with the CC mark, which "
17082 "does not mean that copyright is waived, but that certain freedoms are given."
17085 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17086 #: freeculture.xml:13199
17088 "These freedoms are beyond the freedoms promised by fair use. Their precise "
17089 "contours depend upon the choices the creator makes. The creator can choose a "
17090 "license that permits any use, so long as attribution is given. She can "
17091 "choose a license that permits only noncommercial use. She can choose a "
17092 "license that permits any use so long as the same freedoms are given to other "
17093 "uses (\"share and share alike\"). Or any use so long as no derivative use is "
17094 "made. Or any use at all within developing nations. Or any sampling use, so "
17095 "long as full copies are not made. Or lastly, any educational use."
17098 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17099 #: freeculture.xml:13210
17101 "These choices thus establish a range of freedoms beyond the default of "
17102 "copyright law. They also enable freedoms that go beyond traditional fair "
17103 "use. And most importantly, they express these freedoms in a way that "
17104 "subsequent users can use and rely upon without the need to hire a "
17105 "lawyer. Creative Commons thus aims to build a layer of content, governed by "
17106 "a layer of reasonable copyright law, that others can build upon. Voluntary "
17107 "choice of individuals and creators will make this content available. And "
17108 "that content will in turn enable us to rebuild a public domain."
17111 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><indexterm><primary>
17112 #: freeculture.xml:13231
17113 msgid "Garlick, Mia"
17116 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17117 #: freeculture.xml:13221
17119 "This is just one project among many within the Creative Commons. And of "
17120 "course, Creative Commons is not the only organization pursuing such "
17121 "freedoms. But the point that distinguishes the Creative Commons from many is "
17122 "that we are not interested only in talking about a public domain or in "
17123 "getting legislators to help build a public domain. Our aim is to build a "
17124 "movement of consumers and producers of content (\"content conducers,\" as "
17125 "attorney Mia Garlick calls them) who help build the public domain and, by "
17126 "their work, demonstrate the importance of the public domain to other "
17127 "creativity. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
17130 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17131 #: freeculture.xml:13234
17133 "The aim is not to fight the \"All Rights Reserved\" sorts. The aim is to "
17134 "complement them. The problems that the law creates for us as a culture are "
17135 "produced by insane and unintended consequences of laws written centuries "
17136 "ago, applied to a technology that only Jefferson could have imagined. The "
17137 "rules may well have made sense against a background of technologies from "
17138 "centuries ago, but they do not make sense against the background of digital "
17139 "technologies. New rules—with different freedoms, expressed in ways so "
17140 "that humans without lawyers can use them—are needed. Creative Commons "
17141 "gives people a way effectively to begin to build those rules."
17144 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17145 #: freeculture.xml:13246
17147 "Why would creators participate in giving up total control? Some participate "
17148 "to better spread their content. Cory Doctorow, for example, is a science "
17149 "fiction author. His first novel, <citetitle>Down and Out in the Magic "
17150 "Kingdom</citetitle>, was released on-line and for free, under a Creative "
17151 "Commons license, on the same day that it went on sale in bookstores."
17154 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17155 #: freeculture.xml:13253
17157 "Why would a publisher ever agree to this? I suspect his publisher reasoned "
17158 "like this: There are two groups of people out there: (1) those who will buy "
17159 "Cory's book whether or not it's on the Internet, and (2) those who may never "
17160 "hear of Cory's book, if it isn't made available for free on the "
17161 "Internet. Some part of (1) will download Cory's book instead of buying "
17162 "it. Call them bad-(1)s. Some part of (2) will download Cory's book, like "
17163 "it, and then decide to buy it. Call them (2)-goods. If there are more "
17164 "(2)-goods than bad-(1)s, the strategy of releasing Cory's book free on-line "
17165 "will probably <emphasis>increase</emphasis> sales of Cory's book."
17168 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17169 #: freeculture.xml:13265
17171 "Indeed, the experience of his publisher clearly supports that conclusion. "
17172 "The book's first printing was exhausted months before the publisher had "
17173 "expected. This first novel of a science fiction author was a total success."
17177 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17178 #: freeculture.xml:13271
17180 "The idea that free content might increase the value of nonfree content was "
17181 "confirmed by the experience of another author. Peter Wayner, who wrote a "
17182 "book about the free software movement titled <citetitle>Free for "
17183 "All</citetitle>, made an electronic version of his book free on-line under a "
17184 "Creative Commons license after the book went out of print. He then monitored "
17185 "used book store prices for the book. As predicted, as the number of "
17186 "downloads increased, the used book price for his book increased, as well."
17190 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para>
17191 #: freeculture.xml:13298
17193 "<citetitle>Willful Infringement: A Report from the Front Lines of the Real "
17194 "Culture Wars</citetitle> (2003), produced by Jed Horovitz, directed by Greg "
17195 "Hittelman, a Fiat Lucre production, available at <ulink "
17196 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #72</ulink>."
17199 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17200 #: freeculture.xml:13282
17202 "These are examples of using the Commons to better spread proprietary "
17203 "content. I believe that is a wonderful and common use of the Commons. There "
17204 "are others who use Creative Commons licenses for other reasons. Many who use "
17205 "the \"sampling license\" do so because anything else would be "
17206 "hypocritical. The sampling license says that others are free, for commercial "
17207 "or noncommercial purposes, to sample content from the licensed work; they "
17208 "are just not free to make full copies of the licensed work available to "
17209 "others. This is consistent with their own art—they, too, sample from "
17210 "others. Because the <emphasis>legal</emphasis> costs of sampling are so high "
17211 "(Walter Leaphart, manager of the rap group Public Enemy, which was born "
17212 "sampling the music of others, has stated that he does not \"allow\" Public "
17213 "Enemy to sample anymore, because the legal costs are so high<placeholder "
17214 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>), these artists release into the creative "
17215 "environment content that others can build upon, so that their form of "
17216 "creativity might grow."
17219 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17220 #: freeculture.xml:13307
17222 "Finally, there are many who mark their content with a Creative Commons "
17223 "license just because they want to express to others the importance of "
17224 "balance in this debate. If you just go along with the system as it is, you "
17225 "are effectively saying you believe in the \"All Rights Reserved\" "
17226 "model. Good for you, but many do not. Many believe that however appropriate "
17227 "that rule is for Hollywood and freaks, it is not an appropriate description "
17228 "of how most creators view the rights associated with their content. The "
17229 "Creative Commons license expresses this notion of \"Some Rights Reserved,\" "
17230 "and gives many the chance to say it to others."
17234 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17235 #: freeculture.xml:13319
17237 "In the first six months of the Creative Commons experiment, over 1 million "
17238 "objects were licensed with these free-culture licenses. The next step is "
17239 "partnerships with middleware content providers to help them build into their "
17240 "technologies simple ways for users to mark their content with Creative "
17241 "Commons freedoms. Then the next step is to watch and celebrate creators who "
17242 "build content based upon content set free."
17245 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17246 #: freeculture.xml:13329
17248 "These are first steps to rebuilding a public domain. They are not mere "
17249 "arguments; they are action. Building a public domain is the first step to "
17250 "showing people how important that domain is to creativity and "
17251 "innovation. Creative Commons relies upon voluntary steps to achieve this "
17252 "rebuilding. They will lead to a world in which more than voluntary steps are "
17256 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17257 #: freeculture.xml:13337
17259 "Creative Commons is just one example of voluntary efforts by individuals and "
17260 "creators to change the mix of rights that now govern the creative field. The "
17261 "project does not compete with copyright; it complements it. Its aim is not "
17262 "to defeat the rights of authors, but to make it easier for authors and "
17263 "creators to exercise their rights more flexibly and cheaply. That "
17264 "difference, we believe, will enable creativity to spread more easily."
17267 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><title>
17268 #: freeculture.xml:13351
17272 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><para>
17273 #: freeculture.xml:13353
17275 "We will not reclaim a free culture by individual action alone. It will also "
17276 "take important reforms of laws. We have a long way to go before the "
17277 "politicians will listen to these ideas and implement these reforms. But "
17278 "that also means that we have time to build awareness around the changes that "
17282 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><para>
17283 #: freeculture.xml:13360
17285 "In this chapter, I outline five kinds of changes: four that are general, and "
17286 "one that's specific to the most heated battle of the day, music. Each is a "
17287 "step, not an end. But any of these steps would carry us a long way to our "
17291 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><title>
17292 #: freeculture.xml:13367
17293 msgid "1. More Formalities"
17296 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17297 #: freeculture.xml:13369
17299 "If you buy a house, you have to record the sale in a deed. If you buy land "
17300 "upon which to build a house, you have to record the purchase in a deed. If "
17301 "you buy a car, you get a bill of sale and register the car. If you buy an "
17302 "airplane ticket, it has your name on it."
17306 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17307 #: freeculture.xml:13376
17309 "These are all formalities associated with property. They are requirements "
17310 "that we all must bear if we want our property to be protected."
17313 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17314 #: freeculture.xml:13381
17316 "In contrast, under current copyright law, you automatically get a copyright, "
17317 "regardless of whether you comply with any formality. You don't have to "
17318 "register. You don't even have to mark your content. The default is control, "
17319 "and \"formalities\" are banished."
17322 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17323 #: freeculture.xml:13387
17327 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17328 #: freeculture.xml:13390
17330 "As I suggested in chapter 10, the motivation to abolish formalities was a "
17331 "good one. In the world before digital technologies, formalities imposed a "
17332 "burden on copyright holders without much benefit. Thus, it was progress when "
17333 "the law relaxed the formal requirements that a copyright owner must bear to "
17334 "protect and secure his work. Those formalities were getting in the way."
17337 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17338 #: freeculture.xml:13398
17340 "But the Internet changes all this. Formalities today need not be a "
17341 "burden. Rather, the world without formalities is the world that burdens "
17342 "creativity. Today, there is no simple way to know who owns what, or with "
17343 "whom one must deal in order to use or build upon the creative work of "
17344 "others. There are no records, there is no system to trace— there is no "
17345 "simple way to know how to get permission. Yet given the massive increase in "
17346 "the scope of copyright's rule, getting permission is a necessary step for "
17347 "any work that builds upon our past. And thus, the <emphasis>lack</emphasis> "
17348 "of formalities forces many into silence where they otherwise could speak."
17352 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para>
17353 #: freeculture.xml:13412
17355 "The proposal I am advancing here would apply to American works only. "
17356 "Obviously, I believe it would be beneficial for the same idea to be adopted "
17357 "by other countries as well."
17360 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17361 #: freeculture.xml:13410
17363 "The law should therefore change this requirement<placeholder "
17364 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>—but it should not change it by going back "
17365 "to the old, broken system. We should require formalities, but we should "
17366 "establish a system that will create the incentives to minimize the burden of "
17367 "these formalities."
17370 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17371 #: freeculture.xml:13420
17373 "The important formalities are three: marking copyrighted work, registering "
17374 "copyrights, and renewing the claim to copyright. Traditionally, the first of "
17375 "these three was something the copyright owner did; the second two were "
17376 "something the government did. But a revised system of formalities would "
17377 "banish the government from the process, except for the sole purpose of "
17378 "approving standards developed by others."
17381 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><title>
17382 #: freeculture.xml:13432
17383 msgid "REGISTRATION AND RENEWAL"
17386 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17387 #: freeculture.xml:13434
17389 "Under the old system, a copyright owner had to file a registration with the "
17390 "Copyright Office to register or renew a copyright. When filing that "
17391 "registration, the copyright owner paid a fee. As with most government "
17392 "agencies, the Copyright Office had little incentive to minimize the burden "
17393 "of registration; it also had little incentive to minimize the fee. And as "
17394 "the Copyright Office is not a main target of government policymaking, the "
17395 "office has historically been terribly underfunded. Thus, when people who "
17396 "know something about the process hear this idea about formalities, their "
17397 "first reaction is panic—nothing could be worse than forcing people to "
17398 "deal with the mess that is the Copyright Office."
17401 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17402 #: freeculture.xml:13447
17404 "Yet it is always astonishing to me that we, who come from a tradition of "
17405 "extraordinary innovation in governmental design, can no longer think "
17406 "innovatively about how governmental functions can be designed. Just because "
17407 "there is a public purpose to a government role, it doesn't follow that the "
17408 "government must actually administer the role. Instead, we should be creating "
17409 "incentives for private parties to serve the public, subject to standards "
17410 "that the government sets."
17413 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17414 #: freeculture.xml:13456
17416 "In the context of registration, one obvious model is the Internet. There "
17417 "are at least 32 million Web sites registered around the world. Domain name "
17418 "owners for these Web sites have to pay a fee to keep their registration "
17419 "alive. In the main top-level domains (.com, .org, .net), there is a central "
17420 "registry. The actual registrations are, however, performed by many competing "
17421 "registrars. That competition drives the cost of registering down, and more "
17422 "importantly, it drives the ease with which registration occurs up."
17426 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17427 #: freeculture.xml:13466
17429 "We should adopt a similar model for the registration and renewal of "
17430 "copyrights. The Copyright Office may well serve as the central registry, but "
17431 "it should not be in the registrar business. Instead, it should establish a "
17432 "database, and a set of standards for registrars. It should approve "
17433 "registrars that meet its standards. Those registrars would then compete with "
17434 "one another to deliver the cheapest and simplest systems for registering and "
17435 "renewing copyrights. That competition would substantially lower the burden "
17436 "of this formality—while producing a database of registrations that "
17437 "would facilitate the licensing of content."
17440 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><title>
17441 #: freeculture.xml:13481
17445 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17446 #: freeculture.xml:13483
17448 "It used to be that the failure to include a copyright notice on a creative "
17449 "work meant that the copyright was forfeited. That was a harsh punishment for "
17450 "failing to comply with a regulatory rule—akin to imposing the death "
17451 "penalty for a parking ticket in the world of creative rights. Here again, "
17452 "there is no reason that a marking requirement needs to be enforced in this "
17453 "way. And more importantly, there is no reason a marking requirement needs to "
17454 "be enforced uniformly across all media."
17457 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17458 #: freeculture.xml:13493
17460 "The aim of marking is to signal to the public that this work is copyrighted "
17461 "and that the author wants to enforce his rights. The mark also makes it easy "
17462 "to locate a copyright owner to secure permission to use the work."
17465 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17466 #: freeculture.xml:13499
17468 "One of the problems the copyright system confronted early on was that "
17469 "different copyrighted works had to be differently marked. It wasn't clear "
17470 "how or where a statue was to be marked, or a record, or a film. A new "
17471 "marking requirement could solve these problems by recognizing the "
17472 "differences in media, and by allowing the system of marking to evolve as "
17473 "technologies enable it to. The system could enable a special signal from the "
17474 "failure to mark—not the loss of the copyright, but the loss of the "
17475 "right to punish someone for failing to get permission first."
17479 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para><footnote><para>
17480 #: freeculture.xml:13516
17482 "There would be a complication with derivative works that I have not solved "
17483 "here. In my view, the law of derivatives creates a more complicated system "
17484 "than is justified by the marginal incentive it creates."
17488 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17489 #: freeculture.xml:13509
17491 "Let's start with the last point. If a copyright owner allows his work to be "
17492 "published without a copyright notice, the consequence of that failure need "
17493 "not be that the copyright is lost. The consequence could instead be that "
17494 "anyone has the right to use this work, until the copyright owner complains "
17495 "and demonstrates that it is his work and he doesn't give "
17496 "permission.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The meaning of an "
17497 "unmarked work would therefore be \"use unless someone complains.\" If "
17498 "someone does complain, then the obligation would be to stop using the work "
17499 "in any new work from then on though no penalty would attach for existing "
17500 "uses. This would create a strong incentive for copyright owners to mark "
17504 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17505 #: freeculture.xml:13529
17507 "That in turn raises the question about how work should best be marked. Here "
17508 "again, the system needs to adjust as the technologies evolve. The best way "
17509 "to ensure that the system evolves is to limit the Copyright Office's role to "
17510 "that of approving standards for marking content that have been crafted "
17514 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17515 #: freeculture.xml:13536
17517 "For example, if a recording industry association devises a method for "
17518 "marking CDs, it would propose that to the Copyright Office. The Copyright "
17519 "Office would hold a hearing, at which other proposals could be made. The "
17520 "Copyright Office would then select the proposal that it judged preferable, "
17521 "and it would base that choice <emphasis>solely</emphasis> upon the "
17522 "consideration of which method could best be integrated into the registration "
17523 "and renewal system. We would not count on the government to innovate; but we "
17524 "would count on the government to keep the product of innovation in line with "
17525 "its other important functions."
17528 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17529 #: freeculture.xml:13548
17531 "Finally, marking content clearly would simplify registration requirements. "
17532 "If photographs were marked by author and year, there would be little reason "
17533 "not to allow a photographer to reregister, for example, all photographs "
17534 "taken in a particular year in one quick step. The aim of the formality is "
17535 "not to burden the creator; the system itself should be kept as simple as "
17539 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17540 #: freeculture.xml:13556
17542 "The objective of formalities is to make things clear. The existing system "
17543 "does nothing to make things clear. Indeed, it seems designed to make things "
17547 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><section><para>
17548 #: freeculture.xml:13561
17550 "If formalities such as registration were reinstated, one of the most "
17551 "difficult aspects of relying upon the public domain would be removed. It "
17552 "would be simple to identify what content is presumptively free; it would be "
17553 "simple to identify who controls the rights for a particular kind of content; "
17554 "it would be simple to assert those rights, and to renew that assertion at "
17555 "the appropriate time."
17558 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><title>
17559 #: freeculture.xml:13573
17560 msgid "2. Shorter Terms"
17563 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17564 #: freeculture.xml:13575
17566 "The term of copyright has gone from fourteen years to ninety-five years for "
17567 "corporate authors, and life of the author plus seventy years for natural "
17572 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para>
17573 #: freeculture.xml:13588
17575 "\"A Radical Rethink,\" <citetitle>Economist</citetitle>, 366:8308 (25 "
17576 "January 2003): 15, available at <ulink "
17577 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #74</ulink>."
17580 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17581 #: freeculture.xml:13580
17583 "In <citetitle>The Future of Ideas</citetitle>, I proposed a "
17584 "seventy-five-year term, granted in five-year increments with a requirement "
17585 "of renewal every five years. That seemed radical enough at the time. But "
17586 "after we lost <citetitle>Eldred</citetitle> "
17587 "v. <citetitle>Ashcroft</citetitle>, the proposals became even more "
17588 "radical. <citetitle>The Economist</citetitle> endorsed a proposal for a "
17589 "fourteen-year copyright term.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> "
17590 "Others have proposed tying the term to the term for patents."
17593 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17594 #: freeculture.xml:13595
17596 "I agree with those who believe that we need a radical change in copyright's "
17597 "term. But whether fourteen years or seventy-five, there are four principles "
17598 "that are important to keep in mind about copyright terms."
17602 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
17603 #: freeculture.xml:13603
17605 "<emphasis>Keep it short:</emphasis> The term should be as long as necessary "
17606 "to give incentives to create, but no longer. If it were tied to very strong "
17607 "protections for authors (so authors were able to reclaim rights from "
17608 "publishers), rights to the same work (not derivative works) might be "
17609 "extended further. The key is not to tie the work up with legal regulations "
17610 "when it no longer benefits an author."
17615 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
17616 #: freeculture.xml:13612
17618 "<emphasis>Keep it simple:</emphasis> The line between the public domain and "
17619 "protected content must be kept clear. Lawyers like the fuzziness of \"fair "
17620 "use,\" and the distinction between \"ideas\" and \"expression.\" That kind "
17621 "of law gives them lots of work. But our framers had a simpler idea in mind: "
17622 "protected versus unprotected. The value of short terms is that there is "
17623 "little need to build exceptions into copyright when the term itself is kept "
17624 "short. A clear and active \"lawyer-free zone\" makes the complexities of "
17625 "\"fair use\" and \"idea/expression\" less necessary to navigate."
17629 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para><footnote><para>
17630 #: freeculture.xml:13633
17632 "Department of Veterans Affairs, Veteran's Application for Compensation "
17633 "and/or Pension, VA Form 21-526 (OMB Approved No. 2900-0001), available at "
17634 "<ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #75</ulink>."
17637 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para><indexterm><primary>
17638 #: freeculture.xml:13641
17639 msgid "veterans' pensions"
17642 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
17643 #: freeculture.xml:13625
17645 "<emphasis>Keep it alive:</emphasis> Copyright should have to be renewed. "
17646 "Especially if the maximum term is long, the copyright owner should be "
17647 "required to signal periodically that he wants the protection continued. This "
17648 "need not be an onerous burden, but there is no reason this monopoly "
17649 "protection has to be granted for free. On average, it takes ninety minutes "
17650 "for a veteran to apply for a pension.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
17651 "id=\"0\"/> If we make veterans suffer that burden, I don't see why we "
17652 "couldn't require authors to spend ten minutes every fifty years to file a "
17653 "single form. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
17657 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
17658 #: freeculture.xml:13645
17660 "<emphasis>Keep it prospective:</emphasis> Whatever the term of copyright "
17661 "should be, the clearest lesson that economists teach is that a term once "
17662 "given should not be extended. It might have been a mistake in 1923 for the "
17663 "law to offer authors only a fifty-six-year term. I don't think so, but it's "
17664 "possible. If it was a mistake, then the consequence was that we got fewer "
17665 "authors to create in 1923 than we otherwise would have. But we can't correct "
17666 "that mistake today by increasing the term. No matter what we do today, we "
17667 "will not increase the number of authors who wrote in 1923. Of course, we can "
17668 "increase the reward that those who write now get (or alternatively, increase "
17669 "the copyright burden that smothers many works that are today invisible). But "
17670 "increasing their reward will not increase their creativity in 1923. What's "
17671 "not done is not done, and there's nothing we can do about that now."
17674 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17675 #: freeculture.xml:13661
17677 "These changes together should produce an <emphasis>average</emphasis> "
17678 "copyright term that is much shorter than the current term. Until 1976, the "
17679 "average term was just 32.2 years. We should be aiming for the same."
17682 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17683 #: freeculture.xml:13667
17685 "No doubt the extremists will call these ideas \"radical.\" (After all, I "
17686 "call them \"extremists.\") But again, the term I recommended was longer than "
17687 "the term under Richard Nixon. How \"radical\" can it be to ask for a more "
17688 "generous copyright law than Richard Nixon presided over?"
17691 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><title>
17692 #: freeculture.xml:13677
17693 msgid "3. Free Use Vs. Fair Use"
17696 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17697 #: freeculture.xml:13679
17699 "As I observed at the beginning of this book, property law originally granted "
17700 "property owners the right to control their property from the ground to the "
17701 "heavens. The airplane came along. The scope of property rights quickly "
17702 "changed. There was no fuss, no constitutional challenge. It made no sense "
17703 "anymore to grant that much control, given the emergence of that new "
17707 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17708 #: freeculture.xml:13687
17710 "Our Constitution gives Congress the power to give authors \"exclusive "
17711 "right\" to \"their writings.\" Congress has given authors an exclusive right "
17712 "to \"their writings\" plus any derivative writings (made by others) that are "
17713 "sufficiently close to the author's original work. Thus, if I write a book, "
17714 "and you base a movie on that book, I have the power to deny you the right to "
17715 "release that movie, even though that movie is not \"my writing.\""
17719 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para>
17720 #: freeculture.xml:13700
17722 "Benjamin Kaplan, <citetitle>An Unhurried View of Copyright</citetitle> (New "
17723 "York: Columbia University Press, 1967), 32."
17726 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17727 #: freeculture.xml:13696
17729 "Congress granted the beginnings of this right in 1870, when it expanded the "
17730 "exclusive right of copyright to include a right to control translations and "
17731 "dramatizations of a work.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> The "
17732 "courts have expanded it slowly through judicial interpretation ever "
17733 "since. This expansion has been commented upon by one of the law's greatest "
17734 "judges, Judge Benjamin Kaplan."
17738 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><blockquote><para><footnote><para>
17739 #: freeculture.xml:13713
17743 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><blockquote><para>
17744 #: freeculture.xml:13709
17746 "So inured have we become to the extension of the monopoly to a large range "
17747 "of so-called derivative works, that we no longer sense the oddity of "
17748 "accepting such an enlargement of copyright while yet intoning the "
17749 "abracadabra of idea and expression.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
17752 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17753 #: freeculture.xml:13718
17755 "I think it's time to recognize that there are airplanes in this field and "
17756 "the expansiveness of these rights of derivative use no longer make "
17757 "sense. More precisely, they don't make sense for the period of time that a "
17758 "copyright runs. And they don't make sense as an amorphous grant. Consider "
17759 "each limitation in turn."
17762 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17763 #: freeculture.xml:13725
17765 "<emphasis>Term:</emphasis> If Congress wants to grant a derivative right, "
17766 "then that right should be for a much shorter term. It makes sense to protect "
17767 "John Grisham's right to sell the movie rights to his latest novel (or at "
17768 "least I'm willing to assume it does); but it does not make sense for that "
17769 "right to run for the same term as the underlying copyright. The derivative "
17770 "right could be important in inducing creativity; it is not important long "
17771 "after the creative work is done. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
17774 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17775 #: freeculture.xml:13738
17777 "<emphasis>Scope:</emphasis> Likewise should the scope of derivative rights "
17778 "be narrowed. Again, there are some cases in which derivative rights are "
17779 "important. Those should be specified. But the law should draw clear lines "
17780 "around regulated and unregulated uses of copyrighted material. When all "
17781 "\"reuse\" of creative material was within the control of businesses, perhaps "
17782 "it made sense to require lawyers to negotiate the lines. It no longer makes "
17783 "sense for lawyers to negotiate the lines. Think about all the creative "
17784 "possibilities that digital technologies enable; now imagine pouring molasses "
17785 "into the machines. That's what this general requirement of permission does "
17786 "to the creative process. Smothers it."
17789 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17790 #: freeculture.xml:13751
17792 "This was the point that Alben made when describing the making of the Clint "
17793 "Eastwood CD. While it makes sense to require negotiation for foreseeable "
17794 "derivative rights—turning a book into a movie, or a poem into a "
17795 "musical score—it doesn't make sense to require negotiation for the "
17796 "unforeseeable. Here, a statutory right would make much more sense."
17799 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
17800 #: freeculture.xml:13767
17801 msgid "Goldstein, Paul"
17804 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para>
17805 #: freeculture.xml:13765
17807 "Paul Goldstein, <citetitle>Copyright's Highway: From Gutenberg to the "
17808 "Celestial Jukebox</citetitle> (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003), "
17809 "187–216. <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
17812 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17813 #: freeculture.xml:13759
17815 "In each of these cases, the law should mark the uses that are protected, and "
17816 "the presumption should be that other uses are not protected. This is the "
17817 "reverse of the recommendation of my colleague Paul Goldstein.<placeholder "
17818 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> His view is that the law should be written so "
17819 "that expanded protections follow expanded uses."
17822 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17823 #: freeculture.xml:13773
17825 "Goldstein's analysis would make perfect sense if the cost of the legal "
17826 "system were small. But as we are currently seeing in the context of the "
17827 "Internet, the uncertainty about the scope of protection, and the incentives "
17828 "to protect existing architectures of revenue, combined with a strong "
17829 "copyright, weaken the process of innovation."
17833 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17834 #: freeculture.xml:13780
17836 "The law could remedy this problem either by removing protection beyond the "
17837 "part explicitly drawn or by granting reuse rights upon certain statutory "
17838 "conditions. Either way, the effect would be to free a great deal of culture "
17839 "to others to cultivate. And under a statutory rights regime, that reuse "
17840 "would earn artists more income."
17843 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><title>
17844 #: freeculture.xml:13790
17845 msgid "4. Liberate the Music—Again"
17848 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17849 #: freeculture.xml:13792
17851 "The battle that got this whole war going was about music, so it wouldn't be "
17852 "fair to end this book without addressing the issue that is, to most people, "
17853 "most pressing—music. There is no other policy issue that better "
17854 "teaches the lessons of this book than the battles around the sharing of "
17858 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17859 #: freeculture.xml:13799
17861 "The appeal of file-sharing music was the crack cocaine of the Internet's "
17862 "growth. It drove demand for access to the Internet more powerfully than any "
17863 "other single application. It was the Internet's killer app—possibly in "
17864 "two senses of that word. It no doubt was the application that drove demand "
17865 "for bandwidth. It may well be the application that drives demand for "
17866 "regulations that in the end kill innovation on the network."
17869 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17870 #: freeculture.xml:13808
17872 "The aim of copyright, with respect to content in general and music in "
17873 "particular, is to create the incentives for music to be composed, performed, "
17874 "and, most importantly, spread. The law does this by giving an exclusive "
17875 "right to a composer to control public performances of his work, and to a "
17876 "performing artist to control copies of her performance."
17879 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17880 #: freeculture.xml:13815
17882 "File-sharing networks complicate this model by enabling the spread of "
17883 "content for which the performer has not been paid. But of course, that's not "
17884 "all the file-sharing networks do. As I described in chapter 5, they enable "
17885 "four different kinds of sharing:"
17889 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
17890 #: freeculture.xml:13823
17892 "There are some who are using sharing networks as substitutes for purchasing "
17897 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
17898 #: freeculture.xml:13828
17900 "There are also some who are using sharing networks to sample, on the way to "
17906 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
17907 #: freeculture.xml:13834
17909 "There are many who are using file-sharing networks to get access to content "
17910 "that is no longer sold but is still under copyright or that would have been "
17911 "too cumbersome to buy off the Net."
17915 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
17916 #: freeculture.xml:13840
17918 "There are many who are using file-sharing networks to get access to content "
17919 "that is not copyrighted or to get access that the copyright owner plainly "
17923 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17924 #: freeculture.xml:13846
17926 "Any reform of the law needs to keep these different uses in focus. It must "
17927 "avoid burdening type D even if it aims to eliminate type A. The eagerness "
17928 "with which the law aims to eliminate type A, moreover, should depend upon "
17929 "the magnitude of type B. As with VCRs, if the net effect of sharing is "
17930 "actually not very harmful, the need for regulation is significantly "
17934 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17935 #: freeculture.xml:13854
17937 "As I said in chapter 5, the actual harm caused by sharing is controversial. "
17938 "For the purposes of this chapter, however, I assume the harm is real. I "
17939 "assume, in other words, that type A sharing is significantly greater than "
17940 "type B, and is the dominant use of sharing networks."
17943 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17944 #: freeculture.xml:13861
17946 "Nonetheless, there is a crucial fact about the current technological context "
17947 "that we must keep in mind if we are to understand how the law should "
17951 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17952 #: freeculture.xml:13866
17954 "Today, file sharing is addictive. In ten years, it won't be. It is addictive "
17955 "today because it is the easiest way to gain access to a broad range of "
17956 "content. It won't be the easiest way to get access to a broad range of "
17957 "content in ten years. Today, access to the Internet is cumbersome and "
17958 "slow—we in the United States are lucky to have broadband service at "
17959 "1.5 MBs, and very rarely do we get service at that speed both up and "
17960 "down. Although wireless access is growing, most of us still get access "
17961 "across wires. Most only gain access through a machine with a keyboard. The "
17962 "idea of the always on, always connected Internet is mainly just an idea."
17966 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17967 #: freeculture.xml:13878
17969 "But it will become a reality, and that means the way we get access to the "
17970 "Internet today is a technology in transition. Policy makers should not make "
17971 "policy on the basis of technology in transition. They should make policy on "
17972 "the basis of where the technology is going. The question should not be, how "
17973 "should the law regulate sharing in this world? The question should be, what "
17974 "law will we require when the network becomes the network it is clearly "
17975 "becoming? That network is one in which every machine with electricity is "
17976 "essentially on the Net; where everywhere you are—except maybe the "
17977 "desert or the Rockies—you can instantaneously be connected to the "
17978 "Internet. Imagine the Internet as ubiquitous as the best cell-phone service, "
17979 "where with the flip of a device, you are connected."
17983 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para>
17984 #: freeculture.xml:13911
17986 "See, for example, \"Music Media Watch,\" The J@pan Inc. Newsletter, 3 April "
17987 "2002, available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link "
17991 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
17992 #: freeculture.xml:13893
17994 "In that world, it will be extremely easy to connect to services that give "
17995 "you access to content on the fly—such as Internet radio, content that "
17996 "is streamed to the user when the user demands. Here, then, is the critical "
17997 "point: When it is <emphasis>extremely</emphasis> easy to connect to services "
17998 "that give access to content, it will be <emphasis>easier</emphasis> to "
17999 "connect to services that give you access to content than it will be to "
18000 "download and store content <emphasis>on the many devices you will have for "
18001 "playing content</emphasis>. It will be easier, in other words, to subscribe "
18002 "than it will be to be a database manager, as everyone in the "
18003 "download-sharing world of Napster-like technologies essentially is. Content "
18004 "services will compete with content sharing, even if the services charge "
18005 "money for the content they give access to. Already cell-phone services in "
18006 "Japan offer music (for a fee) streamed over cell phones (enhanced with plugs "
18007 "for headphones). The Japanese are paying for this content even though "
18008 "\"free\" content is available in the form of MP3s across the "
18009 "Web.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
18013 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18014 #: freeculture.xml:13918
18016 "This point about the future is meant to suggest a perspective on the "
18017 "present: It is emphatically temporary. The \"problem\" with file "
18018 "sharing—to the extent there is a real problem—is a problem that "
18019 "will increasingly disappear as it becomes easier to connect to the "
18020 "Internet. And thus it is an extraordinary mistake for policy makers today "
18021 "to be \"solving\" this problem in light of a technology that will be gone "
18022 "tomorrow. The question should not be how to regulate the Internet to "
18023 "eliminate file sharing (the Net will evolve that problem away). The question "
18024 "instead should be how to assure that artists get paid, during this "
18025 "transition between twentieth-century models for doing business and "
18026 "twenty-first-century technologies."
18029 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18030 #: freeculture.xml:13934
18032 "The answer begins with recognizing that there are different \"problems\" "
18033 "here to solve. Let's start with type D content—uncopyrighted content "
18034 "or copyrighted content that the artist wants shared. The \"problem\" with "
18035 "this content is to make sure that the technology that would enable this kind "
18036 "of sharing is not rendered illegal. You can think of it this way: Pay phones "
18037 "are used to deliver ransom demands, no doubt. But there are many who need "
18038 "to use pay phones who have nothing to do with ransoms. It would be wrong to "
18039 "ban pay phones in order to eliminate kidnapping."
18042 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18043 #: freeculture.xml:13945
18045 "Type C content raises a different \"problem.\" This is content that was, at "
18046 "one time, published and is no longer available. It may be unavailable "
18047 "because the artist is no longer valuable enough for the record label he "
18048 "signed with to carry his work. Or it may be unavailable because the work is "
18049 "forgotten. Either way, the aim of the law should be to facilitate the access "
18050 "to this content, ideally in a way that returns something to the artist."
18053 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18054 #: freeculture.xml:13954
18056 "Again, the model here is the used book store. Once a book goes out of print, "
18057 "it may still be available in libraries and used book stores. But libraries "
18058 "and used book stores don't pay the copyright owner when someone reads or "
18059 "buys an out-of-print book. That makes total sense, of course, since any "
18060 "other system would be so burdensome as to eliminate the possibility of used "
18061 "book stores' existing. But from the author's perspective, this \"sharing\" "
18062 "of his content without his being compensated is less than ideal."
18065 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18066 #: freeculture.xml:13964
18068 "The model of used book stores suggests that the law could simply deem "
18069 "out-of-print music fair game. If the publisher does not make copies of the "
18070 "music available for sale, then commercial and noncommercial providers would "
18071 "be free, under this rule, to \"share\" that content, even though the sharing "
18072 "involved making a copy. The copy here would be incidental to the trade; in a "
18073 "context where commercial publishing has ended, trading music should be as "
18074 "free as trading books."
18078 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18079 #: freeculture.xml:13975
18081 "Alternatively, the law could create a statutory license that would ensure "
18082 "that artists get something from the trade of their work. For example, if the "
18083 "law set a low statutory rate for the commercial sharing of content that was "
18084 "not offered for sale by a commercial publisher, and if that rate were "
18085 "automatically transferred to a trust for the benefit of the artist, then "
18086 "businesses could develop around the idea of trading this content, and "
18087 "artists would benefit from this trade."
18090 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18091 #: freeculture.xml:13985
18093 "This system would also create an incentive for publishers to keep works "
18094 "available commercially. Works that are available commercially would not be "
18095 "subject to this license. Thus, publishers could protect the right to charge "
18096 "whatever they want for content if they kept the work commercially "
18097 "available. But if they don't keep it available, and instead, the computer "
18098 "hard disks of fans around the world keep it alive, then any royalty owed for "
18099 "such copying should be much less than the amount owed a commercial "
18103 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18104 #: freeculture.xml:13995
18106 "The hard case is content of types A and B, and again, this case is hard only "
18107 "because the extent of the problem will change over time, as the technologies "
18108 "for gaining access to content change. The law's solution should be as "
18109 "flexible as the problem is, understanding that we are in the middle of a "
18110 "radical transformation in the technology for delivering and accessing "
18114 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18115 #: freeculture.xml:14003
18117 "So here's a solution that will at first seem very strange to both sides in "
18118 "this war, but which upon reflection, I suggest, should make some sense."
18121 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18122 #: freeculture.xml:14007
18124 "Stripped of the rhetoric about the sanctity of property, the basic claim of "
18125 "the content industry is this: A new technology (the Internet) has harmed a "
18126 "set of rights that secure copyright. If those rights are to be protected, "
18127 "then the content industry should be compensated for that harm. Just as the "
18128 "technology of tobacco harmed the health of millions of Americans, or the "
18129 "technology of asbestos caused grave illness to thousands of miners, so, too, "
18130 "has the technology of digital networks harmed the interests of the content "
18135 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18136 #: freeculture.xml:14018
18138 "I love the Internet, and so I don't like likening it to tobacco or "
18139 "asbestos. But the analogy is a fair one from the perspective of the law. "
18140 "And it suggests a fair response: Rather than seeking to destroy the "
18141 "Internet, or the p2p technologies that are currently harming content "
18142 "providers on the Internet, we should find a relatively simple way to "
18143 "compensate those who are harmed."
18146 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para><indexterm><primary>
18147 #: freeculture.xml:14064
18148 msgid "Fisher, William"
18151 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para>
18152 #: freeculture.xml:14030
18154 "William Fisher, <citetitle>Digital Music: Problems and "
18155 "Possibilities</citetitle> (last revised: 10 October 2000), available at "
18156 "<ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #77</ulink>; William "
18157 "Fisher, <citetitle>Promises to Keep: Technology, Law, and the Future of "
18158 "Entertainment</citetitle> (forthcoming) (Stanford: Stanford University "
18159 "Press, 2004), ch. 6, available at <ulink "
18160 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #78</ulink>. Professor Netanel "
18161 "has proposed a related idea that would exempt noncommercial sharing from the "
18162 "reach of copyright and would establish compensation to artists to balance "
18163 "any loss. See Neil Weinstock Netanel, \"Impose a Noncommercial Use Levy to "
18164 "Allow Free P2P File Sharing,\" available at <ulink "
18165 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #79</ulink>. For other proposals, "
18166 "see Lawrence Lessig, \"Who's Holding Back Broadband?\" <citetitle>Washington "
18167 "Post</citetitle>, 8 January 2002, A17; Philip S. Corwin on behalf of Sharman "
18168 "Networks, A Letter to Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr., Chairman of the Senate "
18169 "Foreign Relations Committee, 26 February 2002, available at <ulink "
18170 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #80</ulink>; Serguei Osokine, "
18171 "<citetitle>A Quick Case for Intellectual Property Use Fee "
18172 "(IPUF)</citetitle>, 3 March 2002, available at <ulink "
18173 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #81</ulink>; Jefferson Graham, "
18174 "\"Kazaa, Verizon Propose to Pay Artists Directly,\" <citetitle>USA "
18175 "Today</citetitle>, 13 May 2002, available at <ulink "
18176 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #82</ulink>; Steven M. Cherry, "
18177 "\"Getting Copyright Right,\" IEEE Spectrum Online, 1 July 2002, available at "
18178 "<ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #83</ulink>; Declan "
18179 "McCullagh, \"Verizon's Copyright Campaign,\" CNET News.com, 27 August 2002, "
18180 "available at <ulink url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #84</ulink>. "
18181 "Fisher's proposal is very similar to Richard Stallman's proposal for "
18182 "DAT. Unlike Fisher's, Stallman's proposal would not pay artists directly "
18183 "proportionally, though more popular artists would get more than the less "
18184 "popular. As is typical with Stallman, his proposal predates the current "
18185 "debate by about a decade. See <ulink "
18186 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #85</ulink>. <placeholder "
18187 "type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/> <placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"1\"/>"
18190 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18191 #: freeculture.xml:14026
18193 "The idea would be a modification of a proposal that has been floated by "
18194 "Harvard law professor William Fisher.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" "
18195 "id=\"0\"/> Fisher suggests a very clever way around the current impasse of "
18196 "the Internet. Under his plan, all content capable of digital transmission "
18197 "would (1) be marked with a digital watermark (don't worry about how easy it "
18198 "is to evade these marks; as you'll see, there's no incentive to evade "
18199 "them). Once the content is marked, then entrepreneurs would develop (2) "
18200 "systems to monitor how many items of each content were distributed. On the "
18201 "basis of those numbers, then (3) artists would be compensated. The "
18202 "compensation would be paid for by (4) an appropriate tax."
18205 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18206 #: freeculture.xml:14077
18208 "Fisher's proposal is careful and comprehensive. It raises a million "
18209 "questions, most of which he answers well in his upcoming book, "
18210 "<citetitle>Promises to Keep</citetitle>. The modification that I would make "
18211 "is relatively simple: Fisher imagines his proposal replacing the existing "
18212 "copyright system. I imagine it complementing the existing system. The aim "
18213 "of the proposal would be to facilitate compensation to the extent that harm "
18214 "could be shown. This compensation would be temporary, aimed at facilitating "
18215 "a transition between regimes. And it would require renewal after a period of "
18216 "years. If it continues to make sense to facilitate free exchange of content, "
18217 "supported through a taxation system, then it can be continued. If this form "
18218 "of protection is no longer necessary, then the system could lapse into the "
18219 "old system of controlling access."
18223 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18224 #: freeculture.xml:14092
18226 "Fisher would balk at the idea of allowing the system to lapse. His aim is "
18227 "not just to ensure that artists are paid, but also to ensure that the system "
18228 "supports the widest range of \"semiotic democracy\" possible. But the aims "
18229 "of semiotic democracy would be satisfied if the other changes I described "
18230 "were accomplished—in particular, the limits on derivative uses. A "
18231 "system that simply charges for access would not greatly burden semiotic "
18232 "democracy if there were few limitations on what one was allowed to do with "
18233 "the content itself."
18236 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18237 #: freeculture.xml:14105
18239 "No doubt it would be difficult to calculate the proper measure of \"harm\" "
18240 "to an industry. But the difficulty of making that calculation would be "
18241 "outweighed by the benefit of facilitating innovation. This background system "
18242 "to compensate would also not need to interfere with innovative proposals "
18243 "such as Apple's MusicStore. As experts predicted when Apple launched the "
18244 "MusicStore, it could beat \"free\" by being easier than free is. This has "
18245 "proven correct: Apple has sold millions of songs at even the very high price "
18246 "of 99 cents a song. (At 99 cents, the cost is the equivalent of a per-song "
18247 "CD price, though the labels have none of the costs of a CD to pay.) Apple's "
18248 "move was countered by Real Networks, offering music at just 79 cents a "
18249 "song. And no doubt there will be a great deal of competition to offer and "
18250 "sell music on-line."
18253 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18254 #: freeculture.xml:14120
18256 "This competition has already occurred against the background of \"free\" "
18257 "music from p2p systems. As the sellers of cable television have known for "
18258 "thirty years, and the sellers of bottled water for much more than that, "
18259 "there is nothing impossible at all about \"competing with free.\" Indeed, if "
18260 "anything, the competition spurs the competitors to offer new and better "
18261 "products. This is precisely what the competitive market was to be "
18262 "about. Thus in Singapore, though piracy is rampant, movie theaters are often "
18263 "luxurious—with \"first class\" seats, and meals served while you watch "
18264 "a movie—as they struggle and succeed in finding ways to compete with "
18268 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18269 #: freeculture.xml:14132
18271 "This regime of competition, with a backstop to assure that artists don't "
18272 "lose, would facilitate a great deal of innovation in the delivery of "
18273 "content. That competition would continue to shrink type A sharing. It would "
18274 "inspire an extraordinary range of new innovators—ones who would have a "
18275 "right to the content, and would no longer fear the uncertain and "
18276 "barbarically severe punishments of the law."
18279 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18280 #: freeculture.xml:14141
18281 msgid "In summary, then, my proposal is this:"
18285 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18286 #: freeculture.xml:14146
18288 "The Internet is in transition. We should not be regulating a technology in "
18289 "transition. We should instead be regulating to minimize the harm to "
18290 "interests affected by this technological change, while enabling, and "
18291 "encouraging, the most efficient technology we can create."
18294 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18295 #: freeculture.xml:14153
18296 msgid "We can minimize that harm while maximizing the benefit to innovation by"
18300 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
18301 #: freeculture.xml:14159
18302 msgid "guaranteeing the right to engage in type D sharing;"
18306 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
18307 #: freeculture.xml:14163
18309 "permitting noncommercial type C sharing without liability, and commercial "
18310 "type C sharing at a low and fixed rate set by statute;"
18314 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><orderedlist><listitem><para>
18315 #: freeculture.xml:14169
18317 "while in this transition, taxing and compensating for type A sharing, to the "
18318 "extent actual harm is demonstrated."
18321 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18322 #: freeculture.xml:14174
18324 "But what if \"piracy\" doesn't disappear? What if there is a competitive "
18325 "market providing content at a low cost, but a significant number of "
18326 "consumers continue to \"take\" content for nothing? Should the law do "
18330 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18331 #: freeculture.xml:14180
18333 "Yes, it should. But, again, what it should do depends upon how the facts "
18334 "develop. These changes may not eliminate type A sharing. But the real issue "
18335 "is not whether it eliminates sharing in the abstract. The real issue is its "
18336 "effect on the market. Is it better (a) to have a technology that is 95 "
18337 "percent secure and produces a market of size <citetitle>x</citetitle>, or "
18338 "(b) to have a technology that is 50 percent secure but produces a market of "
18339 "five times <citetitle>x</citetitle>? Less secure might produce more "
18340 "unauthorized sharing, but it is likely to also produce a much bigger market "
18341 "in authorized sharing. The most important thing is to assure artists' "
18342 "compensation without breaking the Internet. Once that's assured, then it may "
18343 "well be appropriate to find ways to track down the petty pirates."
18347 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18348 #: freeculture.xml:14194
18350 "But we're a long way away from whittling the problem down to this subset of "
18351 "type A sharers. And our focus until we're there should not be on finding "
18352 "ways to break the Internet. Our focus until we're there should be on how to "
18353 "make sure the artists are paid, while protecting the space for innovation "
18354 "and creativity that the Internet is."
18357 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><title>
18358 #: freeculture.xml:14205
18359 msgid "5. Fire Lots of Lawyers"
18362 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18363 #: freeculture.xml:14207
18365 "I'm a lawyer. I make lawyers for a living. I believe in the law. I believe "
18366 "in the law of copyright. Indeed, I have devoted my life to working in law, "
18367 "not because there are big bucks at the end but because there are ideals at "
18368 "the end that I would love to live."
18371 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18372 #: freeculture.xml:14213
18374 "Yet much of this book has been a criticism of lawyers, or the role lawyers "
18375 "have played in this debate. The law speaks to ideals, but it is my view that "
18376 "our profession has become too attuned to the client. And in a world where "
18377 "the rich clients have one strong view, the unwillingness of the profession "
18378 "to question or counter that one strong view queers the law."
18382 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para>
18383 #: freeculture.xml:14230
18385 "Lawrence Lessig, \"Copyright's First Amendment\" (Melville B. Nimmer "
18386 "Memorial Lecture), <citetitle>UCLA Law Review</citetitle> 48 (2001): 1057, "
18390 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18391 #: freeculture.xml:14221
18393 "The evidence of this bending is compelling. I'm attacked as a \"radical\" by "
18394 "many within the profession, yet the positions that I am advocating are "
18395 "precisely the positions of some of the most moderate and significant figures "
18396 "in the history of this branch of the law. Many, for example, thought crazy "
18397 "the challenge that we brought to the Copyright Term Extension Act. Yet just "
18398 "thirty years ago, the dominant scholar and practitioner in the field of "
18399 "copyright, Melville Nimmer, thought it obvious.<placeholder "
18400 "type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/>"
18403 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18404 #: freeculture.xml:14236
18406 "However, my criticism of the role that lawyers have played in this debate is "
18407 "not just about a professional bias. It is more importantly about our failure "
18408 "to actually reckon the costs of the law."
18411 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para><footnote><para>
18412 #: freeculture.xml:14246
18414 "A good example is the work of Professor Stan Liebowitz. Liebowitz is to be "
18415 "commended for his careful review of data about infringement, leading him to "
18416 "question his own publicly stated position—twice. He initially "
18417 "predicted that downloading would substantially harm the industry. He then "
18418 "revised his view in light of the data, and he has since revised his view "
18419 "again. Compare Stan J. Liebowitz, <citetitle>Rethinking the Network "
18420 "Economy: The True Forces That Drive the Digital Marketplace</citetitle> (New "
18421 "York: Amacom, 2002), (reviewing his original view but expressing skepticism) "
18422 "with Stan J. Liebowitz, \"Will MP3s Annihilate the Record Industry?\" "
18423 "working paper, June 2003, available at <ulink "
18424 "url=\"http://free-culture.cc/notes/\">link #86</ulink>. Liebowitz's careful "
18425 "analysis is extremely valuable in estimating the effect of file-sharing "
18426 "technology. In my view, however, he underestimates the costs of the legal "
18427 "system. See, for example, <citetitle>Rethinking</citetitle>, 174–76. "
18428 "<placeholder type=\"indexterm\" id=\"0\"/>"
18431 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18432 #: freeculture.xml:14241
18434 "Economists are supposed to be good at reckoning costs and benefits. But "
18435 "more often than not, economists, with no clue about how the legal system "
18436 "actually functions, simply assume that the transaction costs of the legal "
18437 "system are slight.<placeholder type=\"footnote\" id=\"0\"/> They see a "
18438 "system that has been around for hundreds of years, and they assume it works "
18439 "the way their elementary school civics class taught them it works."
18443 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18444 #: freeculture.xml:14270
18446 "But the legal system doesn't work. Or more accurately, it doesn't work for "
18447 "anyone except those with the most resources. Not because the system is "
18448 "corrupt. I don't think our legal system (at the federal level, at least) is "
18449 "at all corrupt. I mean simply because the costs of our legal system are so "
18450 "astonishingly high that justice can practically never be done."
18453 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18454 #: freeculture.xml:14278
18456 "These costs distort free culture in many ways. A lawyer's time is billed at "
18457 "the largest firms at more than $400 per hour. How much time should such a "
18458 "lawyer spend reading cases carefully, or researching obscure strands of "
18459 "authority? The answer is the increasing reality: very little. The law "
18460 "depended upon the careful articulation and development of doctrine, but the "
18461 "careful articulation and development of legal doctrine depends upon careful "
18462 "work. Yet that careful work costs too much, except in the most high-profile "
18463 "and costly cases."
18466 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18467 #: freeculture.xml:14288
18469 "The costliness and clumsiness and randomness of this system mock our "
18470 "tradition. And lawyers, as well as academics, should consider it their duty "
18471 "to change the way the law works—or better, to change the law so that "
18472 "it works. It is wrong that the system works well only for the top 1 percent "
18473 "of the clients. It could be made radically more efficient, and inexpensive, "
18474 "and hence radically more just."
18477 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18478 #: freeculture.xml:14296
18480 "But until that reform is complete, we as a society should keep the law away "
18481 "from areas that we know it will only harm. And that is precisely what the "
18482 "law will too often do if too much of our culture is left to its review."
18485 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18486 #: freeculture.xml:14302
18488 "Think about the amazing things your kid could do or make with digital "
18489 "technology—the film, the music, the Web page, the blog. Or think about "
18490 "the amazing things your community could facilitate with digital "
18491 "technology—a wiki, a barn raising, activism to change something. "
18492 "Think about all those creative things, and then imagine cold molasses poured "
18493 "onto the machines. This is what any regime that requires permission "
18494 "produces. Again, this is the reality of Brezhnev's Russia."
18498 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18499 #: freeculture.xml:14311
18501 "The law should regulate in certain areas of culture—but it should "
18502 "regulate culture only where that regulation does good. Yet lawyers rarely "
18503 "test their power, or the power they promote, against this simple pragmatic "
18504 "question: \"Will it do good?\" When challenged about the expanding reach of "
18505 "the law, the lawyer answers, \"Why not?\""
18508 #. type: Content of: <book><part><partintro><section><section><para>
18509 #: freeculture.xml:14320
18511 "We should ask, \"Why?\" Show me why your regulation of culture is "
18512 "needed. Show me how it does good. And until you can show me both, keep your "
18516 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><title>
18517 #: freeculture.xml:14331
18521 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
18522 #: freeculture.xml:14333
18524 "Throughout this text, there are references to links on the World Wide "
18525 "Web. As anyone who has tried to use the Web knows, these links can be highly "
18526 "unstable. I have tried to remedy the instability by redirecting readers to "
18527 "the original source through the Web site associated with this book. For each "
18528 "link below, you can go to http://free-culture.cc/notes and locate the "
18529 "original source by clicking on the number after the # sign. If the original "
18530 "link remains alive, you will be redirected to that link. If the original "
18531 "link has disappeared, you will be redirected to an appropriate reference for "
18535 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><title>
18536 #: freeculture.xml:14348
18537 msgid "ACKNOWLEDGMENTS"
18540 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
18541 #: freeculture.xml:14350
18543 "This book is the product of a long and as yet unsuccessful struggle that "
18544 "began when I read of Eric Eldred's war to keep books free. Eldred's work "
18545 "helped launch a movement, the free culture movement, and it is to him that "
18546 "this book is dedicated."
18549 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
18550 #: freeculture.xml:14356
18552 "I received guidance in various places from friends and academics, including "
18553 "Glenn Brown, Peter DiCola, Jennifer Mnookin, Richard Posner, Mark Rose, and "
18554 "Kathleen Sullivan. And I received correction and guidance from many amazing "
18555 "students at Stanford Law School and Stanford University. They included "
18556 "Andrew B. Coan, John Eden, James P. Fellers, Christopher Guzelian, Erica "
18557 "Goldberg, Robert Hallman, Andrew Harris, Matthew Kahn, Brian Link, Ohad "
18558 "Mayblum, Alina Ng, and Erica Platt. I am particularly grateful to Catherine "
18559 "Crump and Harry Surden, who helped direct their research, and to Laura "
18560 "Lynch, who brilliantly managed the army that they assembled, and provided "
18561 "her own critical eye on much of this."
18565 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
18566 #: freeculture.xml:14369
18568 "Yuko Noguchi helped me to understand the laws of Japan as well as its "
18569 "culture. I am thankful to her, and to the many in Japan who helped me "
18570 "prepare this book: Joi Ito, Takayuki Matsutani, Naoto Misaki, Michihiro "
18571 "Sasaki, Hiromichi Tanaka, Hiroo Yamagata, and Yoshihiro Yonezawa. I am "
18572 "thankful as well as to Professor Nobuhiro Nakayama, and the Tokyo University "
18573 "Business Law Center, for giving me the chance to spend time in Japan, and to "
18574 "Tadashi Shiraishi and Kiyokazu Yamagami for their generous help while I was "
18578 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
18579 #: freeculture.xml:14380
18581 "These are the traditional sorts of help that academics regularly draw "
18582 "upon. But in addition to them, the Internet has made it possible to receive "
18583 "advice and correction from many whom I have never even met. Among those who "
18584 "have responded with extremely helpful advice to requests on my blog about "
18585 "the book are Dr. Mohammad Al-Ubaydli, David Gerstein, and Peter DiMauro, as "
18586 "well as a long list of those who had specific ideas about ways to develop my "
18587 "argument. They included Richard Bondi, Steven Cherry, David Coe, Nik "
18588 "Cubrilovic, Bob Devine, Charles Eicher, Thomas Guida, Elihu M. Gerson, "
18589 "Jeremy Hunsinger, Vaughn Iverson, John Karabaic, Jeff Keltner, James "
18590 "Lindenschmidt, K. L. Mann, Mark Manning, Nora McCauley, Jeffrey McHugh, Evan "
18591 "McMullen, Fred Norton, John Pormann, Pedro A. D. Rezende, Shabbir Safdar, "
18592 "Saul Schleimer, Clay Shirky, Adam Shostack, Kragen Sitaker, Chris Smith, "
18593 "Bruce Steinberg, Andrzej Jan Taramina, Sean Walsh, Matt Wasserman, Miljenko "
18594 "Williams, \"Wink,\" Roger Wood, \"Ximmbo da Jazz,\" and Richard Yanco. (I "
18595 "apologize if I have missed anyone; with computers come glitches, and a crash "
18596 "of my e-mail system meant I lost a bunch of great replies.)"
18599 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
18600 #: freeculture.xml:14400
18602 "Richard Stallman and Michael Carroll each read the whole book in draft, and "
18603 "each provided extremely helpful correction and advice. Michael helped me to "
18604 "see more clearly the significance of the regulation of derivitive works. And "
18605 "Richard corrected an embarrassingly large number of errors. While my work is "
18606 "in part inspired by Stallman's, he does not agree with me in important "
18607 "places throughout this book."
18610 #. type: Content of: <book><chapter><para>
18611 #: freeculture.xml:14409
18613 "Finally, and forever, I am thankful to Bettina, who has always insisted that "
18614 "there would be unending happiness away from these battles, and who has "
18615 "always been right. This slow learner is, as ever, grateful for her perpetual "
18616 "patience and love."