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Arresting Technology: An Essay, Ann Bartow
Arresting Technology: An Essay, Ann Bartow
Ann Bartow
This Essay considers the current trend of content owners using copyright laws (particularly the doctrine of contributory infringement) to "arrest technology," thereby burdening file sharing technologies with a duty to prevent unauthorized copying of copyrighted works in digital formats. The Author argues that copying is not necessarily theft, and that sharing music files (for example) shouldn't be treated by courts or lawmakers as if it was "the moral equivalent of looting." Instead, copyright owners should take responsibility for developing technological measures to minimize unauthorized copying, so that file trading technologies, themselves often copyrightable innovations, can flourish and copyright law promotes …