“Too often the debate over creative control tends to the extremes. At one pole is a vision of total control — a world in which every last use of a work is regulated and in which “all rights reserved” (and then some) is the norm. At the other end is a vision of anarchy — a world in which creators enjoy a wide range of freedom but are left vulnerable to exploitation. Balance, compromise, and moderation — once the driving forces of a copyright system that valued innovation and protection equally — have become endangered species.”

This opening paragraph to the Creative Commons expresses one of my main concerns with intellectual property laws today in the United States. Like the people at the CC, I feel that copyright is all about the two extremes, either you own everything & then some or nothing at all, which is just highly impractical, I think. There’s no way a copyright holder can crack down on every possible “infringer,” nor is it practical for the courts to have to deal with such trivial litigation. And at the same time, having no rights at all to one’s work can be demoralizing & unrewarding. There has to be a middle road—which CC has created.