Common Knowledge

Hope all the Americans had a good holiday, and that the rest of the world finds peace in a troubled week. To my friends in India and Pakistan, to my colleagues at the Internet Governance Forum this week in Hyderabad...my thoughts are with you all.

Two quick links of much importance in my world:

1. Obama's transition site is under CC-BY.

Via Lessig's blog:

Consistent with the values of any "open government," and with his strong leadership on "free debates" from the very start, the Obama team has modified the copyright notice on change.gov to embrace the freest CC license.

Wow. Obama's team, in the midst of so much other stuff going on, gets the little things right. I for one look forward to a few years of government that gets the little things right, because it augurs well for the big things. Compare this to the copyright maximalism of the past administration (and for what it's worth, other administrations - this is not a partisan thing, but mainly a perspective thing - are you looking at Hollywood or at the Internet for your point of view?) and it's hard not to smile.

2. James Boyle's The Public Domain

Prof. Boyle has released The Public Domain: Enclosing the Commons of the Mind. I have had the great honor to work with Jamie for almost half a decade. He's funny, he's warm, and he's about the best Board member a guy could have. He's also got a wicked editor's pen - I once got a draft document back with more text of his in red than my original in black, and he'd only gotten halfway through before ending with "just start over" and sending on to me. I owe him a lot.

But that's not the reason I'm telling you to buy his book.

Jamie's written a book here that makes a compelling argument, one that lies at the heart of the Science Commons project. It's that, in a digital world, we need a different way to think about intellectual property. Just as it is vital to understand a bit about our environment, or employment law, it's vital to understand a bit about the public domain. And like our environment, it needs some protection.

We have built our IP systems on the metaphor of physical property systems. Fences. But we don't have an Environmental Protection Agency for IP. Nor do we have national parks, or escrow for wetlands, or any other kind of regulating factors that preserve the public interest in intellectual property. Fair use has been badly degraded, to the point that my favorite quote on this is that it's "the right to call your attorney."

In his new book, Jamie lays this all out in a way that is understandable to the non-lawyer. And he makes a passionate argument that we need an environmental movement in the intellectual property space. I agree. But even if you don't, I think you should read it and make an informed decision against - which you can do for free, since the book's online under a CC license. If you like the book I hope you buy a copy.

I bought two.