- Hardcover: 288 pages
- Publisher: Yale University Press (13 Jan 2009)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0300137400
- ISBN-13: 978-0300137408
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 16.3 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 621,227 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
The Public Domain: Enclosing the Commons of the Mind
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Review
"James Boyle['s] new book, "The Public Domain", is a superb introduction to the subject." --The Boston Globe
Review
"... effortlessly lucid and downright witty in places, making it perfect for those living and working outside the ivory tower."
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
If the current regulatory mindset regarding intellectual property had existed when scientist Tim Berners-Lee developed the World Wide Web in 1989, the Internet might never have grown into the remarkable communication, entertainment and archival medium that it is today. Jazz and many other forms of music might never have come into being if governments were as strict decades ago about copyright law as they are now. Today, warns author James Boyle, huge swaths of the world's artistic and cultural heritage - books, photographs, films, musical recordings - are locked up in governmental and private libraries and unavailable for distribution to the general public. Why? No one can identify the copyright holders or their heirs to obtain permission to copy them. The number of such "orphan works" is staggering: more than 95% of all books ever printed, and equally high percentages of film and music. Should the government wall off these potential treasures to protect the rights of nameless individuals, most of whom either don't care or are dead? Boyle, an expert on intellectual property law, thinks not, and he explains why in this heated discussion about trends in his field. getAbstract recommends his illuminating book to writers, inventors, and anyone else involved in the creation of content, as well as to managers and executives who wish both to protect proprietary information and to encourage innovation.
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
A book such as this is going to suffer from a tendency to go out of date. However the author provides a mostly lucid if sometimes wordy historical analysis of the way copyright has become subverted from its original purpose and now threatens creativity and innovation.
The central theme is that nothing will come from nothing (which although a quote from King Lear is luckily out of copyright) and copyright is a barrier locking down most of the culture of the 20th Century.
The geneology of a Ray Charles tune is particularly interesting. As background to the apparent trend to be able to claim copyright over the smallest snippet of a tune I wonder if the copyright holders of Soul Man: The Best of Sam & Dave have ever listened to the opening of "Night Bird Flying" from Cry of Love
The passage about the economic value of copyright is worth a read in its own right. It makes for an interesting compare and contrast with how revenue streams from companies are valued for the purposes of merger and acquisitions.
It has a slight USA bias but then it was written in the USA. It discusses Free and Open Source Software at length. For those interested in matching their understanding the background of the scylla of copyright with the charybdis of software patents they might find Math You Can't Use: Patents, Copyright and Software a useful companion volume. (While software patents are more difficult to obtain in Europe it's not impossible).
The central theme is that nothing will come from nothing (which although a quote from King Lear is luckily out of copyright) and copyright is a barrier locking down most of the culture of the 20th Century.
The geneology of a Ray Charles tune is particularly interesting. As background to the apparent trend to be able to claim copyright over the smallest snippet of a tune I wonder if the copyright holders of Soul Man: The Best of Sam & Dave have ever listened to the opening of "Night Bird Flying" from Cry of Love
The passage about the economic value of copyright is worth a read in its own right. It makes for an interesting compare and contrast with how revenue streams from companies are valued for the purposes of merger and acquisitions.
It has a slight USA bias but then it was written in the USA. It discusses Free and Open Source Software at length. For those interested in matching their understanding the background of the scylla of copyright with the charybdis of software patents they might find Math You Can't Use: Patents, Copyright and Software a useful companion volume. (While software patents are more difficult to obtain in Europe it's not impossible).
Format:Kindle Edition
James Boyle's book is (at least has been for me) a real eye opener. He warns us about the fact that we might be at the beginning of a second enclosure movement which may start to build fences around the public domain we take for granted. He tries (very convincingly) to prove that statement by giving examples of that tendency in different fields, ranging from literature, music, science, software and technology. He stresses that most of the measures that have been taken in the last decades to strengthen intellectual property have not helped to reach the goals that they supposedly follow. Moreover, he devotes a whole chapter to tell us that some of the most striking evidence against the reinforcement of intellectual property is being ignored. For instance, after reading chapter 6, one of my favourites, you realize that it would have been very hard for Ray Charles to create soul music, had he to deal with current intellectual property policies. He finishes the book suggesting that we need and environmentalism for information, comparing the issues around intellectual property with the environmentalist movement, in that it was formed by diverse groups that became aware of the interest they had in common.
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