Stanford Center for Internet and Society

Monday October 25, 2004
12:30 – 1:30 p.m.
Room 180
Free and Open to all!
Lunch Served

Paladin Press publishes a contract murder manual. A Web site operator is sued for linking to copyrighted material, or describing an algorithm for breaking copy protection. A Web page operator is prosecuted for posting bombmaking information. A computer programmer is sued or prosecuted for publicizing holes in a security system. A political activist group is sued for publishing the names and addresses of abortion providers, boycott violators, or police officers. The government issues a secret subpoena under the Patriot Act.

Monday October 18, 2004
12:30 – 1:30 p.m.
Room 180
Free and Open to all!
Lunch Served

Charles E. McLure, Jr.
Senior Fellow
Hoover Institution
Stanford University

Mr. McClure's presentation will address the following questions:

How would a rational sales tax be structured?
How would electronic commerce be taxed in a rational system?
How do state sales taxes depart from the rational model?
How is electronic commerce taxed?
How could sales taxes be rationalized?
What would this imply for taxation of electronic commerce?
What about arguments that electronic commerce should be exempt?
What has happened over the past few years?

Monday September 20, 2004
1:00 – 2:00 p.m.
Room 180
Free and Open to all!
Lunch Served

Jorge will speak about a research he's undertaken in Spain which shatters the protectionist copyright vision that big media, record labels and some politicians would like us to believe.

There is a legal right in Spain called "Private Copy" which allows any individual to make and keep any number of copies of any copyrighted work for his/her personal use as long as it is not for profit.

During the largest gathering of interconnected computer users in the world (which happened in August in Spain), Jorge delivered a conference in which he explained this right to the participants (many of which did not even know they had that right), and then went on to ask them to "download and copy as if there was not tomorrow". Then Jorge collected information on "physical and online sharing of culture". The results were astonishing, shedding new light into alternatives to copyright laws.

Monday April 19, 2004
12:30 – 1:30 p.m.
Room 80 (Moot Courtroom)
Free and Open to all!
Lunch Served

Chris will speak about the conflict between two fundamental changes--one technological, the other legal--that have affected the ability of individuals to cultivate and spread culture.

The technological change is the birth and spread of the Internet. By reducing the cost of creating and disseminating expression, the Internet has profoundly affected the potential for democratic speech and the spread of knowledge.

The legal change is equally as profound. It is the radical shift in the nature and extent of copyright regulation. For the first 190 years of our Republic, copyright law was narrowly tailored to regulate extremely narrowly. But the traditional contours of copyright have now been changed. Whereas for most of our history copyright protection was the exception, it is now the rule. Whereas the burden of copyright previously was limited to works that had some continuing commercial value, copyright now applies broadly and indiscriminately to all creative works, whether or not the protections have any benefit to the author.

Monday April 12, 2004
12:30 – 1:30 p.m.
Room 80 (Moot Courtroom)
Free and Open to all!
Lunch Served

Mary’s talk on “Internet Governance by International Organizations” will survey Internet policymaking at the international level. She will aim to show that, while individual initiatives by separate intergovernmental organizations are considerable feats in and of themselves, what is more remarkable is the sum total of these initiatives, as they point to an emerging international governance framework for the Internet.About the Speaker

Mary Rundle’s background has allowed her to experience global integration from different perspectives. Living in diverse countries has shown her how legal systems can have dramatically different effects on the lives of individuals, while studies and work have taught her how business and intergovernmental relations shape these systems. Her examination of Internet governance by international organizations draws on this experience.

Monday February 15, 2004
12:30 – 1:30 p.m.
Room 80 (Moot Courtroom)
Free and Open to all!
Lunch Served

Beverly Hills Yogi Bikram Choudhury has registered copyright on his book "Bikram's Beginning Yoga Class" and on the series of hatha yoga exercises and poses that he teaches in the book and in his yoga classes. His lawyers claim that these copyrights give him the right to enjoin others from practicing or teaching classes in which students do (or attempt) the poses in the same order. Bikram has sent out hundreds of letters threatening suit against his former students and other yoga instructors for teaching "his" yoga. Brave studio owners and teachers banded together to form Open Source Yoga Unity, a group to defend yoga instructors' right to teach any style of yoga they like, including Bikram-style yoga. OSYU has filed a declaratory judgment suit which is progressing in Federal Court in San Francisco. Elizabeth Rader, along with attorney Jim Harrison, is representing OSYU, and will speak about the case. At issue is more than yoga- if Bikram succeeds, he has essentially obtained patent protection for the entire copyright term; with dangerous implications for the freedom to practice other kinds of physical exercise and activities, including those in the public domain.About the speaker

Monday March 8, 2004
12:30 – 1:30 p.m.
Room 80 (Moot Courtroom)
Free and Open to all!
Lunch Served

The open access (commons) vs. private control debate is raging. It takes place in a number of fields, including the intellectual property and cyberlaw literatures, as well as broader public debates concerning propertization, privatization, deregulation, and commercialization. On the open access side, there is a frequent call for protecting the "commons," but the theoretical support for this prescriptive call is underdeveloped from an economic perspective. By contrast, on the private control side, there is robust economic theory in support of the market mechanism with minimal government regulation. In fact, many that oppose propertization, privatization, deregulation, and commercialization view economics (the discipline) with sincere suspicion and doubt. This creates a pitched battle that stretches beyond normative considerations and at times seems divided at the choice of methodology. I embrace economic theory as a utilitarian discipline, and develop an economic theory of infrastructure that better explains why, for a particular class of important resources, there is a strong normative argument for managing and sustaining the resources as commons. I will discuss briefly three specific areasóenvironmental, information, and Internet resourcesó to illustrate the theory; separate work applies the theory more concretely to these areas.

March 8, 2004
5:45- 7:00 PM
Stanford Law School: Room 290
Free and Open to All

When a technology's integration into society outpaces the laws that govern it, the boundary between lawful and unlawful behavior can blur. Nowhere is this observation more prevalent than in the maelstrom of debate surrounding the peer-to-peer technologies that allow users to download and trade music with an ease and immediacy never before available. This panel will discuss whether downloading music without paying for it is civil disobedience, fair use, or just plain wrong.

The Speakers will use excerpts from an episode of the new docu-drama "K Street" as a springboard for addressing questions like:

Thursday February 19, 2004
12:30 – 1:30 p.m.
Room 80 (Moot Courtroom)
Free and Open to all!
Lunch Served

The digitalization of content is a cornerstone for the further evolution of the information society. At the same time, it is recognized that the public sector collects and produces a very wide range of information in many different areas (geography, weather, traffic, patent and educational, etc.). Service providers trying to take initiatives involving public sector information typically wish to cover various geographical entities. Yet, there are considerable differences in the rules and practices of each EU Member State governing access to and reutilization of public sector information. The recent EU Directive 2003/98 aims at creating a level playing field within the various EU Member States. This lecture sets out the efficiencies sought and discusses the means to achieve them.Erik Valgaeren is a partner at the Brussels office of the international law firm Stibbe. His practice focuses on IT, internet, e-commerce and electronic communications law. His work includes the drafting of contracts, advising on legislation and regulatory aspects and litigation, both before national courts and arbitral tribunals. Typical projects include web services, outsourcing, facilities management, system integration, software implementation, data transmission, databases, privacy and data protection, distribution and partnerships.

Monday February 16, 2004
12:30 – 1:30 p.m.
Room 80 (Moot Courtroom)
Free and Open to all!
Lunch Served

The architecture of the Internet is layered, and this has
consequences for regulators. This talk presents an argument that policy
makers should craft their regulations so as to respect the integrity of the
TCP/IP layers; moreover, regulators should seek to solve problems at the layer
at which they arise. Failure to respect the layers principle damages the
transparency of the internet and is inherently underinclusive and overbroad.

Read Paper.About the Speaker