Communications Law Commons^™

Staying Afloat In The Internet Stream: How To Keep Web Radio From Drowning In Digital Copyright Royalties, Emily D. Harwood

Federal Communications Law Journal

In the 1990's, the development of "streaming" technology allowed webcasters to begin broadcasting music on the Internet. The public took advantage of a plethora of free media players, and the number of web-based radio stations soared. However, a crippling dispute over broadcast rates left the viability of this technology in doubt. This Note criticizes current policies that curtail radio streaming by providing harsh financial restrictions on webcasters. In looking to the future, this Note argues that Congress should extend licensing exemptions to cover those Internet stations most like their AM/FM counterparts who do not have to pay additional fees.

Application Of The Public-Trust Doctrine And Principles Of Natural Resource Management To Electromagnetic Spectrum, Patrick S. Ryan

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

The Electromagnetic spectrum is among our most valuable natural resources. Yet while the past few decades have seen a rich body of environmental law develop for other natural resources, this movement has largely passed over the electromagnetic spectrum. This Article argues that to remedy that situation, the public-trust doctrine, which is now a cornerstone of modern environmental law, should be extended to the electromagnetic spectrum. This extension would not be a leap: the public-trust doctrine has already been used to guarantee the public access to various bodies of water (not just navigable water), and to protect recreational lakes and beaches, …

From The Cluetrain To The Panopticon: Isp Activity Characterization And Control Of Internet Communications, Eric Evans

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

If ISPs are exposed to liability for forwarding others' messages--messages originating with other ISPs or with the ISP's own users--the norm of universal mutual message forwarding that underlies the present operation of the Internet will be threatened. This Note will argue that society presently confronts a choice between a common carrier Internet characterized by universal mutual message forwarding and a monitored and controlled Internet. Part I will describe the underlying rules that govern ISPs' liability for their users' actions. Part II will argue that the present statutory regime governing ISPs' liability for users' copyright infringement includes elements that provide ISPs …

Legislating The Tower Of Babel: International Restrictions On Internet Content And The Marketplace Of Ideas, Michael F. Sutton

Federal Communications Law Journal

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution protects the expression of diverse viewpoints in virtually any medium. Nevertheless, the modern novelty of "borderless" communication via the Internet strains our ideal of keeping government out of the business of regulating speech. This Note reveals the conflict between the First Amendment's national protections and the Internet's lack of national boundaries, while also arguing for international intervention for the protection of free speech. This Author articulates the real danger of "watered-down speech" unless both the FCC and the international community provide regulations and harmonized international standards for online content that reflect First Amendment …

"Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me:" An In-Depth Look At Opportunistic Business Method Patent Licensing And A Proposed Solution To Allow Small-Defendant Business Method Users To Sing A Happier Tune, 37 J. Marshall L. Rev. 1359 (2004), Andrea Lynn Evensen

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

Introduction: Contains Cover, Table Of Contents, Letter From The Editor, And Masthead, Edwin E. Wallis Iii

Richmond Journal of Law & Technology

On behalf of the 2003-2004 Editorial Board, I would like to welcome you to the fourth issue of the Richmond Journal of Law & Technology’s 2003-2004 publication term! Issue 4 is the world’s rst collection of Do Not Call List materials compiled in a single law review issue. Issue 4 contains several preexisting materials, including Congressional testimony, party briefs, and amicus briefs for the Do Not Call List appeal before the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, in additional to original scholarly articles prepared speci cally for the Journal.

The (New?) Right Of Making Available To The Public, Jane C. Ginsburg

Faculty Scholarship

The Berne Convention 1971 Paris Act covered the right of communication to the public incompletely and imperfectly through a tangle of occasionally redundant or self-contradictory provisions on "public performance," "communication to the public," "public communication," "broadcasting," and other forms of transmission. Worse, the scope of rights depended on the nature of the work, with musical and dramatic works receiving the broadest protection, and images the least; literary works, especially those adapted into cinematographic works, lying somewhere in between. The 1996 WIPO Copyright Treaty rationalized and synthesized protection by establishing full coverage of the communication right for all protected works of …

Introduction: A Regulatory Regime For The Internet Age, Philip J. Weiser

Publications

No abstract provided.

Internet Contracting And Standard Terms In The Global Electronic Age: Perspectives For Japan, James Maxeiner

All Faculty Scholarship

This piece is intended to show Japanese law students how their own everyday experiences raise significant domestic and international legal questions. It shows that a seemingly technical matter need not be boring, but can provide an example of practical application of law internationally and of the benefits that knowledge of foreign law can bring in assisting in understanding and improving domestic law. It discusses standard terms in licenses of information and software.

The Broadband Debate, A User's Guide, Tim Wu

Faculty Scholarship

Back in the 1990s, Internet communications policy was easier. It was easy to agree that the network's growth ought not be impended by excessive government regulation. It was easy to hope that the Internet would solve all of its own problems. Yet it turned out that the success of the network was hiding strong differences of opinion. Today, the euphoria is gone, and the divide in Internet communications policy has become clear and unmistakable. It most clearly a divide between two distinct groups: the self-proclaimed "Openists" and "Deregulationists."

This divide will do much to inform the reform of the Telecommunications …

The Need For Revisions To The Law Of Wiretapping And Interception Of Email, Robert A. Pikowsky

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

I argue that a person's privacy interest in his email is the same as his privacy interest in a telephone conversation. Moreover, the privacy interest in email remains unchanged regardless of whether it is intercepted in transmission or covertly accessed from the recipient's mailbox. If one accepts this assumption, it follows that the level of protection against surveillance by law enforcement officers should be the same[...] As technology continues to blur the distinction between wire and electronic communication, it becomes apparent that a new methodology must be developed in order to provide logical and consistent protection to private communications. The …

Promoting Innovation To Prevent The Internet From Becoming A Wasteland, Zoe Baird

Federal Communications Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Regulating Speech Across Borders: Technology Vs. Values, Matthew Fagin

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

The disfavored status within international law of unilateral state-based regulations that target extraterritorial actors arises from the inherent challenges such actions represent to state sovereignty. In the context of the Internet, the complexity of choice-of-law analysis is heightened: regulations imposed by one state have the potential to effectively block communications to citizens of all states and undermine the conflicting regulatory aims of neighboring states. Early legal commentators built upon this cascading chilling effect of state-based regulation to proclaim both the futility and illegitimacy of state-based action in the online environment. Subsequent scholars have demonstrated the commensurability of state-based online regulation …

Encryption Regulation In The Wake Of September 11, 2001: Must We Protect National Security At The Expense Of The Economy?, Matthew Parker Voors

Federal Communications Law Journal

This Note argues that although privacy and economic concerns have ruled the encryption debate during the past decade, the move toward increased privacy on the Internet and relaxed encryption regulation, designed to promote electronic commerce, comes at the expense of national security and the protection of Americans' safety. The Article begins with historical information about encryption and an examination of how businesses use encryption to secure their communications and financial transactions on the Internet. This Section also observes that this technology is employed by terrorist organizations to accomplish the same goal: to send private communications. The Author next details the …

New Media, New Rules: The Digital Performance Right And Streaming Media Over The Internet, Joseph E. Magri

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

Streaming music over the Internet, or what otherwise is known as webcasting or Internet radio, has the potential to become the single most revolutionary means of music transmission ever developed.' In order to appreciate the potential impact of Internet radio, it is helpful to understand that Internet radio has the ability to venture far beyond the at-home personal computer that is tethered to a wall and logged-on to the Internet. With advances in wireless broadband technologies, such as wireless fidelity or Wi-Fi, and the growing availability of Internet content via mobile devices,' Internet radio will soon become widely available on …

Network Neutrality, Broadband Discrimination, Tim Wu

Faculty Scholarship

Communications regulators over the next decade will spend increasing time on conflicts between the private interests of broadband providers and the public's interest in a competitive innovation environment centered on the Internet. As the policy questions this conflict raises are basic to communications policy, they are likely to reappear in many different forms. So far, the first major appearance has come in the "open access" (or "multiple access") debate, over the desirability of allowing vertical integration between Internet Service Providers and cable operators. Proponents of open access see it as a structural remedy to guard against an erosion of the …

Toward A Next Generation Regulatory Strategy, Philip J. Weiser

Publications

The FCC is now facing a set of issues that will help shape the future evolution of the Internet and the role of government in its development. In particular, the FCC is in the midst of designing a regulatory regime for broadband platforms. To do so, the FCC must decide both on the appropriate regulatory classification for such platforms and what legal rules (if any) should govern access to such platforms. This Article explains how the FCC, using its "ancillary jurisdiction" authority under Title I of the Communications Act, can develop a reactive regulatory regime that examines allegations of discriminatory …

Copyright And Computer Programs: A Failed Experiment And A Solution To A Dilemma, William F. Patry

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Can Our Current Conception Of Copyright Law Survive The Internet Age?, Edward Samuels

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Beyond Napster, Beyond The United States: The Technological And International Legal Barriers To On-Line Copyright Enforcement, Jeffrey L. Dodes

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Designing Deliberative Democracy In Cyberspace: The Role Of The Cyber-Lawyer, Beth Simone Noveck

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

The Silenced Minority: When The Riaa Charges College Radio For Online Broadcasts, Will The Public End Up Paying?, Eleanor Lackman

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Modularity, Vertical Integration, And Open Access Policies: Towards A Convergence Of Antitrust And Regulation In The Internet Age, Joseph Farrell, Philip J. Weiser

Publications

Antitrust law and telecommunications regulation have long adopted different stances on whether to mandate open access to information platforms. This article aims to help regulators and commentators incorporate both Chicago School and post-Chicago School arguments in evaluating this basic policy choice, suggesting how they can be integrated in an effective manner. In particular, the authors outline three alternative models that the FCC could adopt to guide its regulation of information platforms and facilitate a true convergence between antitrust and regulatory policy.

Regulatory Challenges And Models Of Regulation, Philip J. Weiser

Publications

No abstract provided.

What’S In A Name?, Jonathan Zittrain

Federal Communications Law Journal

Book Review: Ruling the Root, Milton L. Mueller, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2002, 301 pages.

A review of Milton L. Mueller's Ruling the Root, The MIT Press, 2002. In the spring of 1998, the U.S. government told the Internet: Govern yourself. This unfocused order-a blandishment, really, expressed as an awkward "statement of policy" by the Department of Commerce, carrying no direct force of law-came about because the management of obscure but critical centralized Internet functions was at a political crossroads. In Ruling the Root, Mueller thoroughly documents the colorful history both before and after this moment of inflection, and gives …

The U.S. Supreme Court Addresses The Child Pornography Prevention Act And Child Online Protection Act In Ashcroft V. Free Speech Coalition And Ashcroft V. American Civil Liberties Union, Sue Ann Mota

Federal Communications Law Journal

Both the Child Pornography Prevention Act ("CPPA") and the Child Online Protection Act ("COPA") were intended by Congress to protect minors. The CPPA was intended to protect minors from the harmful effects of virtual child pornography. The COPA was intended to protect minors from pornography currently available commercially on the World Wide Web. However, in 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court addressed the constitutionality of both statutes: The Court struck down sections of the CPPA as overbroad and unconstitutional in Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition. In Ashcroft v. ACLU, the Court upheld some sections of COPA as not unconstitutionally overbroad, but …

Technology Law, J. Douglas Cuthbertson, Glen L. Gross

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Law And Order On The Wild, Wild West (Www), Jeffrey J. Look

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

No abstract provided.

Corporate Cybersmear: Employers File John Doe Defamation Lawsuits Seeking The Identity Of Anonymous Employee Internet Posters, Margo E. K. Reder, Christine Neylon O'Brien

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Communications systems are now wide open and fully accessible, with no limits in range, scope or geography. Targeted audiences are accessible with pinpoint accuracy. Messages reach millions of readers with one click. There is a chat room for everyone. Most importantly, there is no limit on content. Therefore, employees can register their dissatisfaction by posting a message in a chat room. Moreover, the identity of the posting employee is not easily discoverable due to anonymous and pseudonymous communications capabilities. The nature of these online messages is qualitatively different from real-world communications. By way of example, newspapers have a responsibility regarding …

Carnivore, The Fbi’S E-Mail Surveillance System: Devouring Criminals, Not Privacy, Griffin S. Dunham

Federal Communications Law Journal

On July 11, 2000, the FBI intorduced Carnivore, an Internet monitoring system. It was designed, and is used exclusively, to carry out court-ordered surveillance of electronic communications. It is a tangible, portable device, tantamount to a phone tap, that allows the FBI to intercept and collect criminal suspects' e-mail without their knowledge or consent. This Note addresses competing and parallel interests between the government and society to determine the legitimacy and necessity of Carnivore. The purpose of this Note is twofold: first, to demonstrate the need for Carnivore to enable law enforcement to keep up with criminals who utilize cyberspace …