New Copyright Czar; an F for the Drug Czar
Oct 13th, 2008 | 6 responses
Politicians left and right are in the pocket of the copyright cartel that is the American entertainment industry. Matt Asay sees Microsoft and Viacom paving the way to sensible copyright enforcement. We can only hope.
Meanwhile, today President Bush signed a new law creating a Copyright Czar:
The cabinet position will give a single point of authority to a job now handled by a scattered handful of different agencies and committees. It also calls for increased strength to prosecute and punish IP offenders. A provision that hoisted the responsibility for civil (in addition to criminal) prosecutions for IP cases on the Justice Dept. had to be thrown out first, as it would have effectively gave the already over-burdened folks at the DoJ the added enjoyment of being the entertainment companies’ civil trial lawyers. Also, interestingly, the Bush administration apparently forgot about their earlier weariness to politicize a position (by appointment) so closely related to dealings of the legislative branch and the judiciary—because avoiding that kind of thing has been this administration’s hallmark, right?
What it will mean day-to-day for us modern web users remains to be seen, but creating a czar worked so well for the war on drugs, why not try it again?
Yeah, so how did that work out? John Tierney:
The Drug Czar’s Report Card: F
In 2002, the Bush administration’s National Drug Control Strategy set a goal of reducing illegal drug use by 25 percent in five years. This was followed by an unprecedented campaign of persuasion (more than 100 different anti-drug advertisements and commercials) and law enforcement as the number of annual arrests for marijuana possession climbed above 700,000 — higher than ever before, and greater than the combined total for all violent crimes.
Now that the first five years’ results are available, the campaign can officially be called a failure, according to an analysis of federal drug-use surveys by Jon Gettman, a senior fellow at the George Mason University School of Public Policy. The prevalence of marijuana use (as measured by the portion of the population that reported using it in the previous month) declined by 6 percent, far short of the 25-percent goal, and that decline was partially offset by a slight increase in the use of other illicit drugs. As a result, the overall decline in drug use was less than 4 percent.
RELATED: In fairness, Congress pushed the copyright czar on President Bush. Here’s the law: The Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights Act. Radley Balko has more on The Drug Czar’s failings.
6 Responses to “New Copyright Czar; an F for the Drug Czar”
This Copyright Czar is an example of the American obsession with copyright and patent property rights that may slay the innovative goose that has laid the golden egg of American IT innovation.
I would recommend, for anyone interested, an excellent new book on this problem – Michael Heller's “The Gridlock Economy”. We have all heard of the “tragedy of the commons”. Heller has identified a paradox of private property. In Heller's words:
“Usually private ownership creates wealth. But too much ownership has the opposite effect: It creates gridlock. And that is the paradox of free markets. If too many owners control a resource, co-operation breaks down, wealth disappears and everybody loses.”
The classic example of this is the history of the airplane. Though invented by Americans, by about 1910 or so airplane production and innovation had effectively stopped in the United States due to competing lawsuits, court orders and patent claims. Every new designer after the Wrights added something new to improve the airplane. New designs were found by courts to be violations of existing patents.
By this time European airplane designers had begun to pass the United States. With rising international tensions in Europe, and a stagnant airplane industry, the United States government realized it had to act. It formed a consortium, decreeing that everyone shared in airplane innovation, and effectively suspended competing claims and patent lawsuits.
The same legal chaos can be seen today in IT. The US Patent Office has come in for considerable criticism for allowing patents that are essentially “squatting” on an idea by companies who have no other reason for existence than to sue those who actually innovate an idea into reality.
Great empires tend to fall from within. Perhaps that will be the case with America and its remarkable capacity to innovate.
We should remember that the bill authorizing this Czar is bipartisan, and for the benefit of all Americans. The RIAA has said as much, and would they lie to you? (At the last minute, a heroic stand by a single senator stopped the piling on of charges. For example, copying a single movie…should that movie contain several tracks of music…would have otherwise resulted in multiple charges of copyright infringement and an umpteen million dollar fine, instead of one in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.)
“This bill truly is music to the ears of all those who care about strengthening American creativity and jobs,” Mitch Bainwol, chairman and chief executive of the RIAA, said in a statement. “At a critical economic juncture, this bipartisan legislation provides enhanced protection for an important asset that helps lead our global competitiveness. The intellectual property industries are widely recognized as a cornerstone of the U.S. economy. Additional tools for intellectual property enforcement are not just good for the copyright community but for consumers who will enjoy a wider array of legitimate offerings.”
In all fairness, the Drug Czar = Failure.
Marlowecan, thanks for the pointer to Michael Heller's “The Gridlock Economy”. I will be sure to follow up!
Cool, in a few more years we will have the IPPA (Intellectual Property Protection Agency) knocking down doors in the middle of the night, shooting defenseless citizens in their houses and planting Sinatra MP3s on their computers.
Looking forward to it.
When every thing is a crime, we will all be criminals!
“reducing illegal drug use by 25 percent in five years”
This sounds like a variant of a Gore-Obama alternative-energy-use or carbon-reduction goal. Unrealistic, to say the least.