Lessig on Fair Use
Lawrence Lessig has begun a regular series explaining the history and future of Creative Commons on the CC blog. This week he's posted a piece describing CC's approach to fair use:
Digital technologies are changing the balance between these three kinds of uses. As life moves online, "free uses" shrink. Because every act on a digital network produces a copy, and "copies" trigger copyright law, there are vastly fewer "free uses" in digital space than in analog space. This shrinkage means that "fair use" must now shoulder the burden of protecting uses that were before free. Yet there isn't much precedent protecting these new "fair uses."...
To continue reading, click here.
Digital technologies are changing the balance between these three kinds of uses. As life moves online, "free uses" shrink. Because every act on a digital network produces a copy, and "copies" trigger copyright law, there are vastly fewer "free uses" in digital space than in analog space. This shrinkage means that "fair use" must now shoulder the burden of protecting uses that were before free. Yet there isn't much precedent protecting these new "fair uses."...
To continue reading, click here.