Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Beyond Creativity: Copyright As Knowledge Law, Michael J. Madison

Articles

The Supreme Court’s copyright jurisprudence of the last 100 years has embraced the creativity trope. Spurred in part by themes associated with the story of “romantic authorship” in the 19th and 20th centuries, copyright critiques likewise ask, “Who is creative?” “How should creativity be protected (or not) and encouraged (or not)?” and “ Why protect creativity?” Policy debates and scholarship in recent years have focused on the concept of creativity in framing copyright disputes, transactions, and institutions, reinforcing the notion that these are the central copyright questions. I suggest that this focus on the creativity trope is unhelpful. I argue …

The Ethical Visions Of Copyright Law, James Grimmelmann

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

This symposium essay explores the imagined ethics of copyright: the ethical stories that people tell to justify, make sense of, and challenge copyright law. Such ethical visions are everywhere in intellectual property discourse, and legal scholarship ought to pay more attention to them. The essay focuses on a deontic vision of reciprocity in the author-audience relationship, a set of linked claims that authors and audiences ought to respect each other and express this respect through voluntary transactions.

Versions of this default ethical vision animate groups as seemingly antagonistic as the music industry, file sharers, free software advocates, and Creative Commons. …

Foreseeability And Copyright Incentives, Shyamkrishna Balganesh

All Faculty Scholarship

Copyright law’s principal justification today is the economic theory of creator incentives. Central to this theory is the recognition that while copyright’s exclusive rights framework provides creators with an economic incentive to create, it also entails large social costs, and that creators therefore need to be given just enough incentive to create in order to balance the system’s benefits against its costs. Yet, none of copyright’s current doctrines enable courts to circumscribe a creator’s entitlement by reference to limitations inherent in the very idea of incentives. While the common law too relies on providing actors with incentives to behave in …

Custom, Comedy, And The Value Of Dissent, Jennifer E. Rothman

All Faculty Scholarship

In this essay, I comment on Dotan Oliar and Christopher Sprigman's article, There's No Free Laugh (Anymore): The Emergence of Intellectual Property Norms and the Transformation of Stand-Up Comedy, 94 Va. L. Rev. 1787 (2008). Their study of the quasi-intellectual property norms in the stand-up comedy world provides yet another compelling example of the phenomenon that I have explored in which the governing intellectual property regime takes a backseat to social norms and other industry customs that dominate the lived experiences of many in creative fields. The microcosm of stand-up comedy reinforces my concern that customs are being used to …

Draft For Harmless Use: Gleaning From Fields Of Copyrighted Works - 2008, Wendy J. Gordon

Scholarship Chronologically

My inquiry is into whether harmless uses of property should give the property owner a right to sue. Under current law, harmless trespasses to land and to copyrights and patents do indeed give rise to liability. Should they? Neither moral philosophy, political science nor economics deals well with the harmless free-rider. The possibility I'm exploring-- just exploring at this stage-- is the following: that where inexhaustible products like information become a primary source of value, our institutions might serve us better if instead of mandating payment for harmless use via legal compulsion, payment for harmless use be left to the …

The True Colors Of Trademark Law: Green-Lighting A Red Tide Of Anti Competition Blues, Ann Bartow

Law Faculty Scholarship

The elevation of color to stand-alone trademark status illustrates the unbounded nature of trademarks within the judicial consciousness. The availability of color-alone marks also facilitates the commoditization of color in ways that complicate the development and distribution of products and services that use color for multiple purposes conterminously. The economic case for color-alone trademarks is severely undermined by careful observation of the ways that colors are actually deployed in commerce, which makes it clear that the trademarks of multiple goods and services can utilize the same color to telegraph the same message without confusing anyone or diluting the commercial power …

Expanding Preferential Treatment Under The Record Rental Amendment Beyond The Music Industry, Ryan G. Vacca

Akron Law Faculty Publications

This Article explores the development of copyright law’s first sale doctrine and the Record Rental Amendment (RRA) in light of the Sixth Circuit’s interpretation of the RRA in Brilliance Audio, Inc. v. Haights Cross Communications, Inc. This Article does not take issue with the court’s conclusion, but instead uses the differing conclusions of the majority and dissent to illustrate that the RRA exception is in need of Congressional clarification. This Article also examines whether the Record Rental Amendment should be amended to include audiobooks and other non-musical works, concluding that they should. The author then proposes two alternative amendments to …

Book Review, Jennifer L. Behrens

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Creative Commons As Conversational Copyright, Michael Carroll

PIJIP Faculty Scholarship

Copyright law's default settings inhibit sharing and adaptation of creative works even though new digital technologies greatly enhance individuals' capacity to engage in creative conversation. Creative Commons licenses enable a form of conversational copyright through which creators share their works, primarily over the Internet, while asserting some limitation on user's right with respect to works in the licensed commons. More specifically, this chapter explains the problems in copyright law to which Creative Commons licenses respond, the methods chosen, and why the machine-readable and public aspects of the licenses are specific examples of a more general phenomenon in digital copyright law …

The Saga Of A Song: Authorship And Ownership In The Case Of ‘Guantanamera’, Peter L. Manuel

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Intellectual Property And Indigenous Peoples: Adapting Copyright Law To The Needs Of A Global Community, Megan M. Carpenter

Law Faculty Scholarship

The definition and scope of intellectual property and associated laws are under intense debate in the emerging discourse surrounding intellectual property and human rights. These debates primarily arise within the context of indigenous peoples' rights to protection and ownership of culturally specific properties. It is true that intellectual property laws are based on Western, developed markets, Western concepts of creation and invention, and Western concepts of ownership. But whatever their origins, those laws have been, and currently are, the primary vehicle for the protection of artistic, literary, and scientific works worldwide. To segregate indigenous interests from this international legal regime, …

Render Copyright Unto Caesar: On Taking Incentives Seriously, Wendy J. Gordon

Faculty Scholarship

This Essay suggests we bifurcate our thinking. Conventional copyright rules by money, so let it rule the money-bound. Let a different set of rules evolve for more complex uses, particularly when the users have a personal relationship with the utilized text. Much recent scholarship contains dramatic suggestions to secure a freedom to be creative, rewrite, and be imaginative. My work has long sought to defend such freedoms, but I believe we understand imagination and its conditions too little to employ it as a starting point. I suggest instead that we acquire a better conceptual map of the generative process and …

Footnote Draft Of Render Copyright Unto Caesar - 2004, Wendy J. Gordon

Scholarship Chronologically

This essay, however, does not press any particular agenda; rather, it tries to make our thinking about the topic more flexible. It is my hope that some conduct-specific rule as was adopted in the defamation context will eventually be adopted for intellectual property. Copyright law cannot continue forever closing its eyes and hoping its house will stop being haunted.

Where Does Creativity Come From? And Other Stories Of Copyright, Michael J. Madison

Articles

This Commentary on Lydia Pallas Loren, Untangling the Web of Music Copyrights, 53 Case W. Res. L. Rev. 673 (2003), observes that debates over a variety of copyright law issues can be - and in fact, often are - structured in narrative terms, rather than in terms of doctrine, policy, or empirical inquiry. I suggest a series of such narratives, each framed by a theme drawn from a feature film. The Commentary suggests that we should recognize more clearly the role of narrative in intellectual property discourse, and that intellectual property narratives should be examined critically.

A Primer On U.S. Intellectual Property Rights Applicable To Music Information Retrieval Systems, Michael Carroll

PIJIP Faculty Scholarship

Digital technology has had a significant impact on the ways in which music information can be stored, transmitted, and used. Within the information sciences, music information retrieval has become an increasingly important and complex field. This brief article is addressed primarily to those involved in the design and implementation of systems for storing and retrieving digital files containing musical notation, recorded music, and relevant metadata – hereinafter referred to as a Music Information Retrieval System (“MIRS”). In particular, this group includes information specialists, software engineers, and the attorneys who advise them. Although peer-to-peer computer applications, such as Napster’s MusicShare or …

Draft Of Rendering Copyright Into Caesar - 2003, Wendy J. Gordon

Scholarship Chronologically

This article makes a simple suggestion. Copyright rules by money, so let it rule the money-bound. Let a different set of rules evolve for more complex uses, particularly when the users have a personal relationship with the utilized text. Copyright. When new artists make transformative use of existing works in settings not characterized by pre-use commercial negotiations, copyright should avoid imposing a distorting burden.

New Thoughts And Excerpt From On Commodifying Intangibles - 1999, Wendy J. Gordon

Scholarship Chronologically

Here is a ten-page excerpt from! a published piece, followed by some more recent and more random thoughts. Community is not civility. That is, I imagine my ideal community as one where people aren't always sweet to each other; I imagine a community where truth is more important than hurt feelings, and fun is more important than money. I imagine a community of individualists: raucous, iconoclastic. Steve Shiffrin's ROMANCE OF THE FIRST AMENDMENT and Ed Baker's work seems to have the kind of community in mind that I am interested in.

Copyright On The Internet: A Comparison Of U.S. And E.C. Protection, Erik Daems

LLM Theses and Essays

The advancement in technology, the information super highway and the internet have threatened the intellectual property of copyright owners. There is now, a relative ease in the copying, reproduction and transmission of copyrighted work through digitization. This thesis explores the legal systems of the United States, and the European Community, and their proposals towards adequate protection of works from copyright infringement. The thesis examines the competing interests of the copyright owner, the rights of users of the internet, and the role of the legislators in the United States and the European Community in balancing and protecting these interests.

Copyright Protection Of Software, Severine Desimpelaere

LLM Theses and Essays

Computer technology has developed within the last decades with many advancements which require intellectual property protections. This thesis addresses the need for the legal protection of software by the vast body of copyright laws. This thesis examines the history, nature, textual and practical compositions of copyright laws and their adaptability to computer technology. The thesis further analyses the scope of copyright protection with emphasis on the Computer Software Copyright Act of 1980 (CSCA), the regime of international conventions for the protection of software as well as other statutory protections for the owners and users of the software. The thesis concludes …

Digital Image Reproduction, Distribution And Protection: Legal Remedies And Industrywide Alternatives, Jonathan A. Franklin

Librarians' Articles

Section II of this article describes the existing legal claims and remedies available to creators and distributors of stock photos who are confronted with the unauthorized use of their images. Section III discusses the alternatives to individual licensing and enforcement actions. After concluding that a centralized computer distribution and accounting system would best'serve the creators and distributors, section IV suggests how existing industry standards can help tailor the implementation of the collecting society model. Section V briefly discusses the international implications of such a distribution scheme, focusing on the problems of variable copyright terms and foreign collecting societies.

This article …

Draft Of Reality As Artifact: From Feist To Fair Use - 1992, Wendy J. Gordon

Scholarship Chronologically

Lawyers more than most people should be aware that what language calls "facts" are not necessarily equivalent to things that exist in the world. After all, when in ordinary conversation someone says "It's a fact that this [ X ] happened," the speaker usually means, "I believe the thing I describe has happened in the world". But when a litigator says something is a "fact" she often means only that a good faith argument can be made on behalf of its existence. Two sets of fact finders can look at the same event and come to diametrically opposed conclusions-- each …

Draft Of A Labor Theory Of Property - 1990, Wendy J. Gordon

Scholarship Chronologically

The Supreme Court in several recent cases has flirted with the notion that labor gives one an entitlement to ownership: a legal right to bar others from the fruits of that labor or to extract payment from them if they use the fruits without permission. Sometimes articulated in terms of "natural rights," and sometimes in terms of "fairness," this notion is at apparent odds with contract law's insistence that the only "fruits of labor" one is obligated to pay for are those one has agreed in advance to buy.

Proposed Organization And Detailed Table Of Contents - 1990, Wendy J. Gordon

Scholarship Chronologically

For many years copyright was a backwater of the law. Perceived as an esoteric and narrow field beset by hypertechnical formalities, the discipline and its practitioners were largely isolated from scholarly and case law developments in other areas. There were exceptions of course. Well before the explosion of intellectual property litigation in the last twenty years, persons such as Zcharia Chaffee Jr. and Judge Learned Hand brought a wealth of learning and a broad perspective to copyright.

Draft Of New Versus Old Authors - 1990, Wendy J. Gordon

Scholarship Chronologically

Virtually all the issues canvassed above embody the tension that exists in seeking to honor the interests of two generations of creators. For example, the essay has discussed the need for new adaptive artists to have a copyright in their own productions and the dangers that the "subconscious copying rule" poses to new creators, particularly in an age of ubiquitous media.