Lessig (2)

First of all, I have to note that when I started reading this second part of Lessig’s book and he discussed the phenomena of the “chimera” (one person with two sets of DNA, or one animal), my mind immediately went to that creature by the same name in mythology…kind of interesting how genetics and mythological names here combine (unrelated © note!).

 

Anyway, when Lessig discussed “Balances” around page 211, the analogy he used to describe how “we’re focusing on the wrong thing” in the copyright debate was probably the best I’ve seen yet (adding gasoline to a burning fire instead of letting the fire burn itself out).  Policy makers are only making the “problem” of new technologies worse by trying to stop them, but these technologies are not even the real problem.  We’ve become blindsided by these various technologies and their ability to “violate” copyright, and are not paying attention to real cultural threats that have been set in place by policy makers and lobbyists…and frankly it’s scary.