Excellent post. I really love the analogy. Hones...

2012-01-24T09:56:35.334-08:00

Excellent post. I really love the analogy. Honestly, I think the "Frontier Mentality" is more deeply ingrained in the American psyche than most of us realize. I think we've seen a lot of that in this recent debate.

Excellent post. The analogy to the fencing in of t...

2012-01-19T10:28:05.305-08:00

Excellent post. The analogy to the fencing in of the American West is apt. One of my previous professors and mentors, James Boyle, has similarly compared modern intellectual property policy to England's Enclosure Movement.

We already have "digital barbed wire" (borrowing Boyle's words) in the form of technological protection measures (e.g., digital rights management, or DRM). These devices can effectually fence off content (including content in the public domain), preventing even lawful uses (such as fair use). TPMs were given legal backing in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the draconian legislation that Congress passed in 1998. Circumventing TPMs now gives rise to legal liability, even when it is done for otherwise lawful purposes. For instance, if I circumvent the digital encryption on a DVD in order to excerpt a few scenes from a film for a school project, or in order to play the DVD on a computer running Linux, I am breaking the law.

SOPA and PIPA are the latest in a long line of heavy-handed bills pushed by the content industry. I expect we'll see more of these in the future.

Comments on The Eternal Universe: On Barbed Wire Fences and Internet Freedom

Excellent post. I really love the analogy. Hones...

Excellent post. The analogy to the fencing in of t...