[dvd-discuss] The premature declaration of death of copyright (was:Re:[dvd-discuss] Slashdot interview with Lessig)

[Mikael Pawlo <mikael(at)pawlo.com>]

At 21.03 -0800 02-01-04, microlenz@earthlink.net wrote:
>Actually there is another group out there...public indifference to
>copyright. Macauley wrote of it in 1861. When the public becomes
>totally indifferent to copyright-copyright will be over. A wonderful
>system killed by the greed of copyright holders. As with Hamlet the
>question is "to be or not to be..."

That is true, but the "digital copyright is dead" thesis raised by John
Perry Barlow in Wired 1994 has yet to prove itself. If you compare the
situation in 1861 to today, we have international copyright now. This is
what the DVD discussion is all about. The courts seems to enforce the DVD
regional division on basis of copyright statues deriving from the Berne
Convention. Hence, we have much stronger protection for the copyright
proprietor today than we had in 1861. The DMCA is not a unique idea. In
Europe, a new copyright directive will implement the possibility of
protection of "technical security measures", not very different in
principle from the anti-circumvision provisions in the DMCA.

Even though the public may be less concerned about copyright (are they
really? - I don't think they care at all), I think the Napster case show us
that copyright was prematuerly declared dead. I agree with John Perry
Barlow in priniciple in his Economy of Ideas, but I think we will have to
wait for a very long time - I won't live to see it - for copyright to be
declared dead. Life plus seventy rights will be there for as long as we
live. And even though the public might start to disregard them and it's
more or less impossible to protect them in the digital age, the courts will
most probably still uphold them.

The Economy of ideas by John Perry Barlow:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.03/economy.ideas.html


Best regards

Mikael Pawlo

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