I've signed The Public Domain Manifesto.
Shouldn't you?
Karma indeed: Geist: Record industry faces liability over `infringement'.
I signed Pam Samuleson's marvelous Academic Author Letter setting out a number of flaws in the proposed Google Books settlement.
It's probably the best-drafted and most cogent group letter I've ever signed. And, wow, I'm in good company among the signatories.
James Grimmlenn announces The Public Index: A Website to Study and Discuss the Google Book Search Settlement:
The groundbreaking proposed settlement in the Google Book Search case is so complex that controversy has outpaced conversation and questions have outnumbered answers. We aim to help close these gaps. The Public Index is a website featuring a collection of tools and resources for those wishing to learn about the settlement or to express opinions about it.
The centerpiece of the site is an interactive version of the proposed settlement. Users can search freely, browse by section, or read through it in a hierarchical view that retains the settlement's indentation structure. Hyperlinks allow users to look up any defined term or cross-reference with a single click. A paragraph-by-paragraph commenting system allows them to annotate individual portions of the settlement with their own commentary. To encourage further discussion, the site also provides a full set of bulletin-board forums.
There's more…
Judge Posner has proposed that we ban hyperlinking in order to save newspapers.
Expanding copyright law to bar online access to copyrighted materials without the copyright holder's consent, or to bar linking to or paraphrasing copyrighted materials without the copyright holder's consent, might be necessary to keep free riding on content financed by online newspapers from so impairing the incentive to create costly news-gathering operations that news services like Reuters and the Associated Press would become the only professional, nongovernmental sources of news and opinion.
Copyfight says that this is Proof That Even Very Smart People Can Say Very Stupid Things. Brilliant as Judge Posner most undoubtedly is, and will full respect for his many true contributions to legal thinking, this is far from the first such example he has provided us. (Recall Posner on rape, or on baby-selling.) Which, along with a certain degree of unpredictability, is why he's not on the Supreme Court, even though most lawyers would rank him as at least one of the most brilliant legal scholars of his generation.
EFF's Fred von Lohmann has a very nice analysis of the copyright law quagmire caused by President Obama's gift of an iPod with 40 show tunes to the Queen of England.
I am not a copyright scholar, but I think Fred may have left out one aspect of the issue which I think means that the Queen can enjoy her iPod in peace: sovereign immunity.
In the US “sovereign immunity” is something that keeps you and me from suing the government for certain classes of misdeeds. But, as I understand it, in the UK sovereign immunity means…sovereign immunity. The Queen IS the THE sovereign. She has immunity. It's really pretty much that simple.
The government in the UK doesn't have “sovereign” immunity because it's not sovereign. Sovereigns have two legs. The UK government just has “government” immunity. In practice that works like our sovereign immunity, so no one minds. But the distinction matters when you are thinking about the Queen's legal exposure in what are “her own courts.” And although I don't know UK copyright law, I'm guessing she didn't waive anything….
(As Fred noted when I sent him an earlier draft of the above, Obama's import to the UK is likely protected by diplomatic immunity. So the issues, whatever they are, are US law issues.)
Jotwell Blenderlaw