I don't know that I can say that I'm surprised. The Supreme Court
signaled that it was going to take a hands off approach in its
constitutional analysis of copyright law /Eldred v. Ashcroft/, and it
would have been unexpected for them to reverse course here. Congress
has a very free hand in how to shape copyright law.
In a way, I feel that popularized constitutional arguments can do
more harm than good. There's a somewhat dangerous tendency to equate
important rights with the constitution, and to then assume that any bad
law passed by Congress can be somehow fixed in the courts. With
copyright, however, almost every battle will be won in the legislature,
not the judiciary.
I hope that SOPA and PIPA serve as something of wake up call, in
this respect. Rights holder have long painted themselves as the only
stakeholders in copyright, and have a great track record at lobbying.
They can quite easily get bills with very scary consequences on track to
pass without much debate. Frequently, we the public don't pay much
attention until the eleventh hour, quietly assuming that anything
horrific would have been challenged early on will be found invalid by
the courts. With copyright law, however, neither of these assumptions
are true, and the eleventh hour is often too late.
--Christian
On 1/18/2012 7:31 AM, Elizabeth Stark wrote:
On a day of such significance for online activism, this is quite a let
down for the public domain.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "Phil Malone" <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>>
Date: Jan 18, 2012 7:26 AM
Subject: [berkmanfriends] Big Loss for the Public Domain in the
Supreme Court Today -- Golan v. Holder
To: "Berkman Friends" <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>>
http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/11pdf/10-545.pdf
6-2 (with Kagan recused), the Court says Congress is not barred by the
Constitution from ripping works that have passed into the public
domain out and placing them back under copyright. Not surprising but
truly unfortunate.
P
_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
[email protected]
http://lists.freeculture.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
FAQ: http://wiki.freeculture.org/Fc-discuss
_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
[email protected]
http://lists.freeculture.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
FAQ: http://wiki.freeculture.org/Fc-discuss
