In publishing a searchable database of thousands of emails from Sony Pictures Entertainment last month, Wikileaks has given the public a peek behind the curtain of the Motion Picture Association of America’s (MPAA) use of government power to silence free speech and stifle innovation. For months, Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood has targeted Google with subpoenas — including a crushingly…

The following piece was co-authored by R Street Innovation Policy Director Mike Godwin. During the Great Depression, farm-equipment giant John Deere Co. famously refused to repossess tractors it had sold to American farmers who were having difficulties keeping up with their payment plans. In a particularly ironic illustration of just how much that spirit of bonhomie has evaporated in the…

U.S. Trade Regulators’ Criticism of Other Nations’ IP Practices is Flawed, Biased San Francisco – Overly broad intellectual property (IP) laws in Russia, Colombia, and Pakistan—which U.S. trade regulators say aren’t tough enough—stifle access to innovation and threaten artists, students, and creators around the globe with prison, censorship, and state prosecution, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) said in a new…

Last week the International Anti-Counterfeiting Coalition (IACC) held their spring conference in San Diego, to share intelligence about the latest strategies for combatting “counterfeiting” (by which they mean trademark infringement) and “piracy” (by which they mean copyright infringement). EFF’s Jeremy Malcolm attended as an invited panelist, giving us the opportunity to assert our views that anti-piracy campaigns should not infringe…

Today, Public Knowledge joins Re:Create, a new coalition dedicated to promoting balanced copyright laws in the United States. As a partnership between public interest groups and trade associations, Re:Create will work to ensure that copyright laws are clear, simple and transparent while still fostering innovation, creativity, education and economic growth. Public Knowledge will work with Re:Create to engage and inform…

WHY BALANCED COPYRIGHT IS ESSENTIAL FOR CREATIVITY by JONATHAN BAND on APRIL 29, 2015 Today, Maria Pallante, the Register of Copyrights, will testify in the House Judiciary Committee’s twentieth (and perhaps final) hearing in its ongoing copyright review. In her written statement, the Register correctly recognizes that “the ultimate beneficiary of copyright law is the public at large” and that…

*Guest post by Jonathan Band, policybandwidth* In her wrap-up testimony yesterday in the House Judiciary Committee’s two-year Copyright Review, Maria Pallante, the Register of Copyrights, identified three categories of policy issues: those that are ready for legislative process, those that warrant near-term study and analysis, and those that warrant further attention. Unfortunately, what many perceive to be the Copyright Act’s…

NPR’s All Things Considered features the American Library Association’s Sari Feldman on library adoption of 3D printers. The implication of 3D printing technology under current copyright policy is an important topic.  To learn more, please check out Progress in the Making: 3D Printing Policy Considerations through the Library Lens from the American Library Association, and Public Knowledge’s papers, It Will Be Awesome…

After decades of increasingly draconian statutes and judicial decisions, our copyright system has veered far away from its original purpose. To help get copyright back on track, EFF is joining forces with a variety of groups—including libraries, industry associations, and public interest advocates—to launch a new coalition focused on promoting smart, balanced copyright policy: Re:create. Restoring a sense of balance,…

Today, CDT joins other non-profit advocacy organizations and trade associations in launching the Re:Create Coalition.  Re:Create represents an effort to simplify and balance copyright law and policy, identifying what works well and what doesn’t.  Through the coalition, CDT hopes to advance conversations about copyright beyond false dichotomies that needlessly pit creators of copyrighted works against consumers and innovators. This coalition…