Syllabus

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The Future of Copyright and Entertainment

  • Alternative compensation and consumption models (Terry Fisher/Noank, anystreet, imeem, hulu, tip jars, the MPAA deal, girl talk; Gray Tuesday/downhill battle)
  • RIAA case against individual file sharers as a strategic move
  • Comparative/int’l angles

Changing trends in Consumption & Creation of Music and other Performance Art

Presenters: Joe Fishman, Miriam Weiler (perhaps there is some possibility of collaboration with those working on the Tenenbaum suit?)

Alternatives to iTunes for Access to Copyrighted Works

We are beginning to see more and more choices for where and how to get copyrighted music. Gone are the days when it was either download illegally on programs such as Limewire or pay for them on iTunes. There have been attempts at creating new marketplaces from scratch such as at Aimee Street, which lowers the cost of discovering new music by setting price according to download popularity. Then there has been Grooveshark, which charges for downloads from its user-uploaded library but actually gives a cut to the original uploader. And then we find the advertisement-driven revenue model creeping in, such as at Imeem, the third-most popular social networking site on the Internet as of August (behind only facebook and MySpace).

It's clear that the days of CD browsing at Tower Records are behind us. And while iTunes has been the one primarily filling the vacuum, the proliferation of web-based alternatives is making things interesting. Are any of these models likely to succeed? Are our methods of music consumption likely to have an impact on our methods of music production? And just where does the recording industry fit in to all of it?

Maybe John Buckman, from Magnatune?
Not sure how to integrate Fan Culture & Vidding into a broader discussion of changing consumption patterns of music?


Old Laws/New Media

Shubham Mukherjee, Debbie Rosenbaum, and Matt Sanchez (as noted above, collaboration with the "Changing Trends..." group? Are these separate topics warranting their own respective days?


How has new media affected traditional communications and media industries and challenged traditional law? How do we deal with the fact that there is little legal infrastructure that takes into account today's new media environments? Do we apply old laws to new technologies, or do we create new regulations? How can we create sound policy that aligns with both traditional legal and moral aspirations while according with today's technological realities?

This topic will aim to explore these general questions through the specific example of Sony BMG v. Tenenbaum, a federal file-sharing case the three of us are working on with Professor Charles Nesson, co-founder of the Berkman Center.

Speaker Ideas: Google Telecom Lawyer Rick Whitt or Google Antitrust lawyer Dana Wagner.

The Internet and Publication

Presenters: Gwen, Lee, Jon

The internet has completely changed the meaning of publication, and the relationship between print and digital media is continually evolving. The advent of the personal computer and the internet have changed the way information is assembled, distributed, managed, and digested in ways at least as dramatic and consequential as the advent of the printing press. How are traditional publishers coping with these changes? What new forms of publishing are made possible by the internet, and what challenges do they entail? --Gwen 16:34, 1 December 2008 (EST)

The Publication Process

Open Access Publishing

Addressing whether there actually seems to be a movement toward this model, and away from traditional science/tech publishing. What effects movement toward this model might have on quality, oversight, etc. of published articles. Also, discussion of business models/funding, problems with open access models, etc. And any copyright issues (to tie things back to law).

This can relate both to open access of full articles (as with PLoS) or single experiments/results (including Science Commons and like projects to both make the data available, and, perhaps more importantly, the technologies to make it available in usable form)

Would "open review" (instead of "peer review") work? Are there any models around? What about a Slashdot-style system of moderation and meta-moderation?

Yes, there is at least one example that I can think of. Lawrence Lessig published the first edition of his book Code in 1999. It came out in paper and ink. Several years later, in order to "translate" (his word) the book into a second edition, Lessig persuaded the publisher (Basic Books) to allow him to post the entire text of the first edition of the book on a wiki hosted by Jotspot. (The Wiki text was licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License.) Lessig explains, "a team of 'chapter captains' helped facilitate a conversation about the text. There were some edits to the text itself, and many more valuable comments and criticisms. I then took that text as of the end of 2005 and added my own edits to produce this book." (Preface to Code version 2.0, x.) Code version 2.0 is the result of this collaborative editing process. It is available for purchase in paper and ink, for free as a PDF download, and also on a wiki hosted by Socialtext. --Gwen 15:45, 1 December 2008 (EST)

Collaborative and Customized Textbooks

Maybe also Harvard's new open access policy for academic work? (note that the Harvard Free Culture group is working on the matter - see The Weeler Declaration)

JZ described an innovative publication option with which Foundation Press seems willing to experiment: essentially, individual chapters are available independently from one another, giving instructors the freedom to custom build a text book that contains exactly their desired materials (no more, and no less), in the desired sequence. Assuming this model is technologically, legally, and financially feasible, what benefits and drawbacks does it entail? Possible risks might include a lack of completeness and/or organization in the materials ultimately acquired by students as well as the possibility that pedagogical emphasis is dictated by sociologically driven group trends rather than deliberately thoughtful decision making. --Gwen 15:57, 1 December 2008 (EST)

Self Publication

One of the biggest and most obvious changes wrought by the advent of the internet and PCs the ability of individuals to self-publish; it is now cheap, quick, and easy to reach a mass audience with one's own text, images, and sounds. The rise of blogging, Youtube, and other developments have further increased the ease of self-publication. I know that several scholars have studied the rise and impact of self publication opportunities, but I'm not sure what conclusions they've drawn or which of them might be interesting to bring in as a guest. Suggestions? --Gwen 16:09, 1 December 2008 (EST)

The Relationship Between Print and Digital Media

Google Book Search

What does the recent settlement between Google and the Authors Guild/American Association of Publishers regarding online accessibility of digitalized books mean? Many have hailed it for both improving access to knowledge by creating "the long dreamed of universal library" and for avoiding a judicial resolution that might have exposed antiquated aspects of US copyright law. But there may also be troubling aspects of having access to such a large and unique collection of content controlled by a single for-profit company (the agreement is non-exclusive to Google, but it may be difficult for a legitimate competitor to emerge, given Google's sizable first mover advantage).

Is this settlement optimal for all interested groups? Presumably it is for Google and the Authors Guild/AAP, but what about externalities for non-parties, such as the reading public? Is some sort of government intervention appropriate to ensure access to this "universal library"? What difference does it make, if any, that this "universal library" is operated by a private company reliant on many public university libraries?

The Shifting Role of Publishing Companies

As noted above under "Self Publication," the internet makes it very easy for individuals to make their work widely available. However, actually garnering a sizable audience or realizing a profit from one's work remains a greater challenge; it appears to be with respect to this step that the services of traditional publishers appear to retain some value. After all, publishing companies offer marketing channels and name recognition in addition to simply machines that print a books. Are traditional publishing companies threatened by the new forms of publishing that the internet makes possible? Are publishers better off battling the internet (for example, by emphasizing the superiority and reliability of their traditional services) or embracing it (for example, by offering digital and internet-based publication services)? --Gwen 16:16, 1 December 2008 (EST) Should the latter services and items -- such as ebooks, audiobooks in mp3 format, and Amazon Kindle -- be replacements for or compliments to printed books? --Gwen 07:32, 2 December 2008 (EST)

The Fate of Printed Materials

Will the internet cause the use of printed materials to decline to the point that printed materials become obsolete? Obsolescence is reality in my own experience with The Harvard Journal of Law and Technology (JOLT). JOLT publishes its articles online on its website, and it also publishes shorter and more timely posts online in its companion, the JOLT Digest. In addition to being available directly to any internet user, all JOLT articles are made available through legal research databases, including Westlaw and Lexis. Each semester, we order from our publisher (Hein) enormous boxes of the new issue in print, but we have no idea what to do with them. Even after giving away copies to our parents, there are still stacks and stacks of unwanted and unneeded paper copies, and a lighthearted dialogue about what to do with them has steadily taken over the dry erase board in our office. These printed copies of our journal are literally useless. --Gwen 16:32, 1 December 2008 (EST)

The way that readers encounter and digest information is vastly different in the context of printed materials and in the context of digital and online materials. These differences have consequences for both academic researchers and regular citizens in terms of both the kind of information an individual is exposed to and the way that the individual approaches those sources. If a dramatic shift away from printed media is happening, what other shifts does that entail for the way that people learn, synthesize, and evaluate information? --Gwen 16:45, 1 December 2008 (EST)

We talked about an interesting article relating to the topic of how digital media and the internet are affecting the way in which people read in JZ's 1L reading group. The article relates more to how the presentation of written material on the 'net (short and skimmable, links galore, etc.) is affecting the way we process information and our ability to read "long" pieces (ie. more than a page or so) without becoming distracted. It is a bit tangential to the specific discussion of the movement of print media onto digital form (since it mostly discusses the differences between the format of media in each of the forms), but is interesting regardless. Lbaker 08:55, 2 December 2008 (EST)

Distribution Channels

How is the internet changing the way printed materials are distributed? Amazon.com appears to be taking over the role of brick-and-mortar bookstores by offering a cheaper and more convenient way to purchase new printed books; their "look inside" feature makes the online shopping experience even more similar to being in a live bookstore. Similarly, Abebooks.com and similar websites have made it possible for individuals to locate and purchase used, out-of-print, and rare books from one another without requiring the research services of specialized booksellers. Even if hard copy printed materials remain in demand, might bookstores become obsolete? --Gwen 19:41, 4 December 2008 (EST)

Possible Guests

  • Google book digitization people and/or members of the authors guild
  • Amazon Kindle people
  • People from publishing companies doing offering innovative services, products, or editing processes involving the internet. (Does anybody know of such companies?)
  • Someone who has studied self publication on the internet (names?)
  • Someone who has studied reading habits in conjunction with the shift away from printed media (names?)
  • Lessig? (he is probably more useful for a different topic)

Free and Open Source Software

Presenters: dulles,Ayelet (Maybe)

How can a dispersed, multilingual collection of coders working for free assemble something as complicated as a web browser, let alone an entire operating system? Open-source projects are famously free-wheeling, but different organizational models and tools have sprung up to solve these obstacles.

What are the forces that drive hackers to contribute to open source projects? What, if anything, can we learn from applying theories of gift economies to open source projects? Should we read Lewis Hyde's The Gift? (n.b. i may be motivated by my own desire to read the book -- dulles)

  • Eric Raymond/OSI ?
  • PJ/Groklaw
  • Strategies and indemnities (e.g. SCO v. IBM)
  • Questioning the foundations of the free software movement (i.e. the "four freedoms")[1] -- how much does access to the source code really matter anymore? Are there alternative theories (e.g. "generativity") that better capture the values at stake? Affero License? (Eben Moglen?)
  • The organization/groups/cooperation questions: how do free software projects organize and govern themselves, and what broader lessons might be learned from it? (e.g. debian, IETF)

(This marks my initial claim to the topic, though I would be overjoyed to work with others - dulles)

Philanthropy/Causes/Cooperation via the Internet

Presenters: Rainer + Whoever is interested!

When does it work, when does it not? and why?

Examples:

  • Pledgebank
  • Facebook Causes

People:

  • Prof. Yochai Benkler
  • Tom Steinberg

Of course there are a lot of custom-built tools for mobilizing people online to get things done in the real world. On the other hand, what about more general tools? We've all been invited, via Facebook, to join groups and attend events (the Obama campaign certainly made good use of this); is there a generalizable model here?

Facebook groups dedicated to particular causes remind me of the online petitions that began circulating widely via email about ten years ago: their effectiveness in accomplishing real world change--and even their visibility to individuals capable of affecting the desired changes--are dubious. Is the real purpose of these movements simply to make participants feel like they are being active and involved? What percentage of those who signed email petitions in the 1990s were aware that their signatures were unverifiable and that the widely-distributed emails were unlikely to be collated and submitted to an official authority? What expectations do participants in facebook group causes have for their involvement and its consequences? The facebook group causes are certainly more centralized and visible than the old email petitions, and they provide a better tool for identifying and communicating with supporters in order to mobilize them in an organized fashion. How often is such mobilization attempted, and with what degree of success? As a tool of online activism, is facebook a step forward from chain emails, is it a step in a different direction, or does it just serve the same old functions but in newer packaging? --Gwen 08:26, 29 November 2008 (EST)

Maybe we can invite some of the leaders of the various social networking sites or Jascha Franklin-Hodge, who was an architect of the Obama campaign's use of social technology.

Might also be worth considering SMS applications that interface with the internet in this context especially since cell phones will presumably be the nexus of tech activism in the developing world. See FrontlineSMS or Ushahidi, a web crisis mapping project that let any user with a cell phone text in reports of violence in post-election Kenya as a way to geographically report real-time citizen reporting. (ELANA)

Meta-Pundit

Presenters: Conor Kennedy

PREMISE

During the 2008 Presidential Campaign, web-only advertisements helped to shape the talking points of media personalities like Chris Matthews , Keith Olbermann, Greta Van Susteren, and Joe Scarborough, and sometimes even individuals who try to operate "above the fray" of punditry like Jon Stewart, Jay Leno, and David Letterman (See "Web-only campaign advertisements flood presidential race" "In a study released last summer....the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found most Americans heard about the most famous viral videos because they saw them replayed on TV").

Because a large and increasing number of Americans get their news from media personalities rather than from traditional broadcast or print media sources, these individuals have significant power to shape the national political discussion. Still, beyond campaigns' web-only ads, there hasn't yet been a concerted effort to use the Internet to directly influence these personalities and their television shows.

PROPOSAL

This void can be filled by a website that publishes a rating system and gauges/grades each of these media personalities (over multiple periods of time: daily [i.e., per episode], monthly, etc.) with a variety of qualitative metrics.

Ideally, such metrics would focus on process rather than substance (e.g., % of material that avoids explicit mention of either party's talking-points-of-the-day; % of in-show discussion that is active, fair dialogue with guests of opposing perspectives). Some metrics would be determined by the site's designers while others would be generated and selected (i.e., voted on) by the site's users. A team of qualitative analysts would code each media personality's episodes for (1) the site designers' metrics and (2) any given metric a critical mass the website's users select, and publish the results daily.

This website would be most influential as a source for audience feedback beyond bare headcounts (i.e., network viewer ratings). For some media personalities, that feedback will act as a friendly nudge that helps them improve their shows. For others, the ultimate message might sound more like Jon Stewart on Crossfire.

QUESTIONS (each followed by potential answers)

  • (1) How should this kind of a site be funded, and by whom?
    • Non-partisan journalism NGOs through a project grant
    • The Berkman Center (see "Donations" link in navigation pane in left frame)
  • (2) What kind of knowledge workers would the daily operations require?
    • College research assistants as coders
  • (3) What kind of goals should such a website pursue?
    • Active dialogue
    • More informed discussion
    • Sophistication of television personalities
    • Honesty
    • Bipartisanship
    • Dedication to truth
    • Fighting the political class's elitism
    • Fighting prejudices/smears
    • Deconstructing euphemistic language/political correctness
    • Strengthening/Weakening political parties' control of the national political dialogue
    • Expansion of the national political dialogue to include new and unique perspectives
  • (4) How else could a pundit-centric website serve to channel the widespread complaints of "Media Bias" into a polished online platform?
    • Hall of Shame for self-proclaimed (one-time guest) "Analysts" and "Experts" who actually have no rightful claim to either title.
    • Sponsor and/or Host Op-Eds, Blogs, Vlogs, "Blogologues", and "Diavlogs" by premier Media/Journalism academics.
    • Work to immediately uncover the original sources of stories in order (1) to get a sense of who is already influencing media personalities (and their writers) and (2) to push back against rushed vetting of unsubstantiated stories (a la Martin Eisenstadt)
    • Highlight stories/angles the traditional anchors are broadcasting that these hosts are ignoring/purposely passing on.
  • (5) How much embedded footage of actual shows can such a website legally display under Fair Use?

--CKennedy 01:42, 25 November 2008 (EST)

There was a group at the University of Michigan looking at a similar issue a couple years ago... if you'd like, I can try to look them up. Dan Ray 13:10, 1 December 2008 (EST)

The Internet and Societal Inequity

Presenters: Mark, Graham (possibly)

Socio-technical Gap

Problems encountered in the act of discoursing itself are sometimes addressed via social means, technological means, or both. It has been suggested that technological tools should support social processes, but there is an adaptation of each realm to the other - how does this back-and-forth take place in the design of a successful technology-enabled discussion?

Which inequalities are created or strengthened due the increasing reliance on technology and the differences in the ability to access the Internet(e.g. global and socio-economic differences)? Does the net actually re-distribute and decentralize power and influence, or does it also reinforce the existing political and economic hierarchies? In short - is the Internet really a good thing for everybody?

  • A solutions-focused question here might be: what tools might encourage a more egalitarian internet, both nationally and internationally? How can online applications be designed to encourage social equality? (Berkman Fellow Eszter Hargittai has worked on some related questions, focusing on research about how people actually use the internet.) --G 12:12, 28 November 2008 (EST)

One Laptop Per Child

Happy to help this group with info as I can. Mchua

Environmental Concerns

To what extent is the hardware upon which the Internet exists damaging the environment? Where does old tech go when it dies? What distributive impact does the "recycling" of old tech have. Was the Internet build with principles of physical sustainbility in mind? Is it too late to change? How do individual companies, like Google, view their own practices? Does the cost of a server internalize the cost of disposal? Why has it been cheaper to just keep throwing on new machines? What of the electricity necessary to run these machines? What does it say about society that we are so willing to pollute our own communities to create a second life? Has technological innovation and advancement dislocated the true impact of non-zero cost transactions? --Megerman 19:36, 29 November 2008 (EST)

Prediction Markets

Presenters: Matthew, Elisabeth

Intrade, etc.

Tradesports announced last week that it will cease operations at the end of this month. Does fallout from the current economic crisis include regulatory changes that spell doom for online prediction markets? Or is something else going on here? --Gwen 11:05, 26 November 2008 (EST)

Could prediction markets transform how we govern ourselves? Robin Hanson proposes Futarchy. The idea in brief:

"Democracies often fail to aggregate information, while speculative markets excel at this task. We consider a new form of governance, wherein voters would say what we want, but speculators would say how to get it. Elected representatives would oversee the after-the-fact measurement of national welfare, while market speculators would say which policies they expect to raise national welfare. Those who recommend policies that regressions suggest will raise GDP should be willing to endorse similar market advice."

  • Michael Abramowitz (sp?), book on prediction markets
  • Justin Wolfers
  • Bo Cowgill, Hal Varian: Google prediction markets

Anonymity and privacy

Dan Ray

  • Facebook + google people?
  • another way to look at it is as a matter of cybercrime and such - new surveillence methods (also relevant in regards to child pornography, for example). i wander if these are too different topics or not. Ayelet
  • I'd like to see a segment on what "privacy" actually means in law and in culture. This would probably attach well to any other, more applied segment. Dan Ray 16:38, 3 December 2008 (EST)

The Future of News

Presenters: Dharmishta Rood, Jon Fildes

The traditional media industry is in turmoil. Circulation of newspapers is falling. Staff are being laid off, costs are being cut and foreign bureaus are being shut. Audiences are fragmenting, advertising spending is plummeting and the valuations of companies is dropping. TV and radio are experiencing similar problems. Some papers are even outsourcing local news reporting to India!

Most of these changes have been blamed on the arrival of the web, which has changed how information is produced and consumed. Now, anyone can be a news gatherer, publisher and distributor. The balance of power has changed.

Yet at the same time, the web offers these organisations a huge opportunity. Already, groups such as spot.us and Pro Publica are experimenting with new business models. Others, such as the Christian Science Monitor, have ditched the old way of doing things and have gone entirely online. Many are using the web to reach out to audiences and connect with them in new ways.

But, are they doing enough? Will experiments like this be enough to save news organisations? Does it matter if they disappear? Should governments intervene to save them in the same way as they have decided to prop up the ailing car manufacturing industry? Is this an appropriate intervention? Should it be left to market forces? What values are at stake beyond what the markets appear to be able to sustain? Ultimately, what is the future for “old media”?

Possible contributors:

The Communication Initiative is an organization in this domain with a compelling problem that they'd like advice on solving, and they're very enthusiastic and willing to work with the class. They're focused on the use and support of communication for economic and social development (http://www.comminit.com) with a large and varied network (over 70,000 total) of members all over the world. Their question: given the challenges the face (enumerated more in the details section), how do we guide and engage our network more through our interactive online processes instead of through email?" More information available at The Communication Initiative (they wrote up a problem statement for us!) - is this something people would be interested in taking on? I would be... Mchua 21:21, 30 November 2008 (EST)

Internet/network Security

Jgruensp (fun topics, all: we could invite the CSIS commission which has been grappling with all these issues and is desperate for legal guidance)

Internet Dependency (What if someone somehow takes down the net?)

Dan Ray (maybe)

We have come to rely on the Internet for almost every aspect of our lives. If the Internet somehow suddenly went "down" (through either a cyberattack or physical attack on key backbone pieces of infrastructure), the result would likely be calamity, as well as hordes of people who wouldn't know what to do with themselves. Can we even imagine what the world would look like the morning after such an attack if it was successful? Are we wrong to rely so heavily on a single tool whose detailed technical inner workings so few people truly understand? Are we setting ourselves up to be ruined when someone compromises this tool? What about the tradeoffs between keeping the Net free+open vs. regulation to ensure that it retains its functional integrity in the face of attack?

We can invite Dan Kaminsky, who recently discovered a flaw in the inner-workings of the Net that could have caused some serious damage. See, e.g., http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/09/technology/09flaw.html?hp (or we could invite will smith, who defeated the aliens in independence day with the help of cyber-attack).

  • I vote Will Smith. Unless everyone wants to get into the desirability of a DNS nonce of sufficient bitlength, in which case... no, still Will Smith. That guy's an elliptic curve cryptography fiend. However, if we do want to talk about design issues in the internet, and the failure of the marketplace to handle externalities created by poor software design, leading to the perpetual crisis of bugginess, we could do worse than to invite Daniel Bernstein. Plus, as an added bonus, he saw the issues that gave rise to the Kaminsky bug coming down the pike a long time ago. --Jgruensp

Internet as International Conflict Zone

Dan Ray (maybe)

In light of the recent events in Estonia, have we finally reached the long-predicted era of cyberwarfare? Is cyber-espionage a counterintelligence problem or something more? (This article from the National Journal talks bluntly about perceived threats, although is perhaps a little too willing to attribute causation of certain events to Chinese actors on dubious evidence)

Internet as an Extension of National Infrastructure

Dan Ray (maybe)

It is easy to define the borders of the nation in realspace (ports, airports, land crossings), and the tradeoffs between private propertyholders' rights and national security interests (making those tradeoffs? Not always so easy). But what are the national borders in cyberspace? Given the dangers described in the two topics above, what kind of role, if any, should national government play in monitoring and regulating major backbone communications links? What about the networks of semi-public industries such as utilities? Private corporations that store government secrets? Financial systems? Other types of privately owned networks?

--Jgruensp 23:54, 30 November 2008 (EST)

Rights of Minors

presenters: Vera (maybe)

Minors have long been recognized to not have free speech rights that are co-extensive with adults. But with the Internet, how do we define those rights? And what, if any, regulation should the government enact to protect minors on the Internet, while also respecting their rights?

There are two traditional categories where minors' free speech rights have been restricted. The first is with respect to pornography, the second with respect to the school environment. These two areas raise different concerns.

Internet + Environment + Venture Capital

  • Peter Thiel, John Doerr, Google people
  • Presenters: Andrew Klaber and DAL
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