Digital Copyright

Litman's explanation of how Congress has essentially abdicated its responsibilities by turning over the drafting of copyright law to the entrenched business interests is scary. But more frightening are the implications: When major chunks of our culture are locked behind individual use licenses, little room is left for innovation and creativity. The end result, I fear, will be a world where every last piece of information and our entertainment will be fed to us by Disney, Time Warner, and a few other mega-corporations. Not that I have anything against those firms, but a 35-page menu listing only variations of spaghetti is not my idea of fine dining.

Copyright used to be about a bargain - society gave limited rights to copyright owners to encourage creativity - in return society obtained building blocks for further creativity. But the model has changed - now the discussion (such as it is) is about the absolute property rights of the media company. (We don't even talk about "authors" anymore - who wrote "Finding Nemo" anyway?) The result is that the public's end of the bargain has been taken away - fair use is of little use anymore, and the first sale doctrine (which allows you to read, re-read, loan, sell, or destroy this book) has been emptied of any meaning with regards to digital media.

Litman does a great job in explaining how ugly the current copyright laws are, and she demonstrates clearly how the system threatens to stifle innovative new ways to communicate and entertain via the Internet. There is clearly room to build on her arguments to demonstrate that the current regime will likely stifle creativity in general. For more on that general theme, I recommend following up Litman's book with one or two by Lawrence Lessig.

All in all, this book is an easy-to-read but very illuminating starting point in understanding exactly how threatening, and intolerable, the copyright regime has begun. Read it, and weep.


Foundation for the copyright quagmire   February 25, 2004
 3 out of 4 found this review helpful

I found this book to be an easy read over the weekend and very comprehensible, even to the layperson who does not have a legal background yet who might have interest.

The bottom line is that copyright law and the meshing of digitization is not black and white yet is gray and murky. Until case law and the creatives reach some kind of a negotiation or a consensus, it will continue to be murky.

And, in our society we may have to agree to disagree with certain elements.

One of the strongest points brought out in this book was that if people don't believe in the law, they will not uphold it and there is not a lot that the government can do. I'm certainly not condoning illegal behavior yet there is a strong point to be made.

Our law was supposed to be written as one that would flex with the times yet we've found that digitization challenges the perceptions behind the laws that were set early and into the mid 1900's.

In conclusion, there is no conclusion and the story is still being written yet this book provides an excellent historical context for why copyright is as sensitive and muddy as it is and provides a good look at the dichotomies between the copyright exclusive owners and users.