This week, the Copyright Alternative in Small-Claim Enforcement (CASE Act) will very likely pass the House. Like a quiet tidepool of bipartisanship in otherwise raging waters, congressional support for America’s entrepreneurial creators—photographers, illustrators, designers, musicians, authors, et al—is a matter about which both Republicans and Democrats agree. And they have not been terribly receptive to the Big-Tech-funded arguments against this legislation for ...
A recent anti-CASE Act post by Daniel Takash of the Niskanen Center once again demonstrates why the tentacles of Google-funded “think tanks,” are the informational equivalent of “tobacco industry biologist” or “oil industry climatologist.” Not only does Takash lead with the unfounded prediction that CASE provides a rich framework for copyright trolls, his post comprises a handful of talking points ...
It remains a popular talking point among copyright skeptics to say that copyright limits free speech. When this refrain was played a little over a week ago on Twitter by ReCreate’s Joshua Lamel, I responded that those who keep saying it are “hair-splitting to the point of pedantry.” Lamel replied with the assertion that everyone agrees with this trope—all copyright scholars across the spectrum ...
Remember the Trans Pacific Partnership? The twelve-nation trade agreement that became an eleven-nation trade agreement when the U.S. pulled out? As a general opinion, I will propose that when both a Bernie Sanders and a Donald Trump want to thrash a Fair Trade Agreement (FTA), it’s a pretty good indication that diametrically opposing ideologies have come to the same naïve conclusion. Whether one’s anti-globalism is ...
As the copyright small claims provision, the CASE Act, continues to acquire congressional sponsors—96 House Members and 14 Senators to date—the EFF is amping up the scare-tactics with blunt messages asking the average internet user if they could afford a $30,000 fine for copyright infringement. Clearly, the EFF expects this strategy to work because they think people are not smart enough ...
