Law Commons^™

Property Rights To Information, Jamie Lund

Jamie Lund

Laws against defamation regulate information sharing by correcting misstatements of fact in order to protect reputations. One benefit of enforcement of defamation laws is the reduction of information pollution. Misinformation increases search costs and thereby reducing efficiency in the procurement of accurate information. First Amendment protection over false speech has expanded over the last half century, decreasing the occurrence of defamation suits, leaving the information field wide open for information pollution undeterred by defamation suits. The market for information has changed dramatically with the popularization of the Internet, the exponential growth of speakers in the past decade, and the corresponding …