May 7th, 2007
Harvard Law prof weighs in on RIAA
In the May 1st issue of The Harvard Crimson, Harvard Law Professor Charles Nesson spoke out against the RIAA's stepped-up attempts to turn "librarians and administrators [into] copyright police". While he claimed to understand the RIAA's motivation, he noted that "mere understanding is no reason for a university to voluntarily assist the RIAA with its threatening and abusive tactics." Most importantly, he argues that intellectual property laws developed over the last 200 years are utterly outdated and need to change with an entirely new paradigm in terms of technology and access to digital material.
Additionally, Professor Nesson noted that RIAA's recent actions (including sending 1200 pre-litigation letters to universities to be passed on to students)
"…distort the University’s educational mission. They impose financial and non-monetary costs, including compromised student privacy, limited access to genuine educational resources, and restricted opportunities for new creative expression."
Certainly, Professor Nesson is not advocating for free and unrestricted access to copyrighted material. Limewire is not the answer. However, he points to initiatives at Harvard and industry-wide that allow for more innovative digital rights management than that represented by the RIAA's "draconian" approach.
Follow Chris Dawson on Twitter! Christopher Dawson is the technology director for the Athol-Royalston School District in northern Massachusetts and a member of the Internet Press Guild. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations, but always keep in mind that the opinions expressed here are his own and not those of his daytime employer, even if he talks incessantly about his day job.
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