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The American Library Association, with the help of PublicKnowledge, has won its case challenging the FCC's Broadcast Flag regulation. The opinion is here and fantastic.
PK had to pay for the lawyers to litigate this case. This is a big victory. Supporters should consider returning the favor with some support.
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» Court Nixes "broadcast flag" from Zmetro.com
Some sanity in the copyright wars a Federal appeals court has overturned the FCC's rule requiring that consumer electronic makers help restrict the copying of digital TV broadcasts. Michael Grebb | Lessig | Dave Winer on things worth copying, or... [Read More]
» Broadcast Flag-Burning from Dark Authority
According to Lawrence Lessig and the EFF, the FCC's Broadcast Flag mandate has been struck down by The US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit... [Read More]
» Return of the Broadcast Flag? from Mediacentric
Much like the bad guy in a bad slasher flick, the Broadcast Flag looks to be hard to kill. Last week's Federal Appeals Court decision simply said that the FCC didn't have the authority to issue the mandate, not that it was a bad idea.
Many people,... [Read More]
» Flagitious ‘Broadcast Flag’ Legislation Flagging from TechBlog
TITLE: Flagitious ‘Broadcast Flag’ Legislation Flagging
URL: http://techblog.techangels.us/PermaLink.aspx?guid=5cfc7356-e50b-4f9d-8bcc-cbd00d1d834f
IP: 66.132.200.142
BLOG NAME: TechBlog
DATE: 05/13/2005 08:29:03 AM [Read More]
Lessig Blog by Lawrence Lessig is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License.
Comments (8)
Dr. Lessig gave the wrong donation URL for Public Knowledge. This is the right one.
Corrected. And btw: not a Dr., just a lawyer.
Awesome! It makes me very happy to hear this. Congrats!
Correct me if I'm wrong, but afaik the decision was due to matters of form (FCC lacks authority to regulate to the extent it tried to). But, although this is a good thing(tm) for the short term, it would be simple enough to 1) confer such authority from the legislative level or 2) do the same thing by law. Don't you think this is the most likely outcome?
that's exactly where the battle will -- and ought to -- shift.
It would be a shame if congress granted the FCC such authority. As far as I'm concerned the FCC's attempt to force the broadcast flag upon consumers constitutes an attempt to regulate copying, a form of authority that properly belongs to congress and not to the FCC. Certain regulatory powers should remain in congress and not be delegated. The FCC's authority should be narrow and should serve the public rather than broadcasters and copyright holders.
I suspect copyright holders will lobby congress to impose such restrictions by law, and I fear that a challenge against such legislation would not succeed (consider what's happened -- or not happened -- to the DMCA). I hope I'm wrong, but I don't have much faith in the courts anymore.
Speaking of shifting the battle to the legislature, Commons Music is doing that as we speak:
http://commonsmusic.com/blog/?p=21
Correct me if I'm wrong, but afaik the decision was due to matters of form (FCC lacks authority to regulate to the extent it tried to). But, although this is a good thing(tm) for the short term, it would be simple enough to 1) confer such authority from the legislative level or 2) do the same thing by law. Don't you think this is the most likely outcome?