The Center for Internet and Society at Stanford Law School is a leader in the study of the law and policy around the Internet and other emerging technologies.
Copyright and Fair Use
A healthy copyright system must balance the need to provide strong economic incentives through exclusive rights with the need to protect important public interests like free speech and expression. Fair use is foundational to that balance. It's role is to prevent copyright from stifling the creativity it is supposed to foster, and from imposing other burdens that would inhibit rather than promote the creation and spread of knowledge and learning.
The Fair Use Project (FUP) was founded in 2006 to provide legal support to a range of projects designed to clarify, and extend, the boundaries of fair use in order to enhance creative freedom and protect important public rights. It is the only organization in the country dedicated specifically to providing free and comprehensive legal representation to authors, filmmakers, artists, musicians and other content creators who face unmerited copyright claims, or other improper restrictions on their expressive interests. The FUP has litigated important cases across the country, and in the Supreme Court of the United States, and worked with scores of filmmakers and other content creators to secure the unimpeded release of their work.
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Non-Residential Fellow
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Brett Frischmann
Affiliate ScholarBrett Frischmann’s expertise is in intellectual property and internet law. After clerking for the Honorable Fred I. Parker of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and practicing at Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering in Washington, DC, he joined the Loyola University Chicago law faculty in 2002. He has held visiting appointments at Cornell and Fordham. Read more » about Brett Frischmann
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Lauren Gelman
Non-Residential FellowLauren is an experienced attorney, frequent speaker and start-up advisor who has worked in the field of Internet law and policy since 1995. She is the founder of BlurryEdge Strategies, a legal and strategy consulting firm located in San Francisco that advises technology companies and investors on cutting-edge legal issues. Lauren previously led the Center for Internet and Society at Stanford Law School and taught at the Law School and the Department of Engineering. Read more » about Lauren Gelman
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Jennifer Granick
Director of Civil LibertiesJennifer Granick is the Director of Civil Liberties at the Stanford Center for Internet and Society. Jennifer returns to Stanford after working with the internet boutique firm of Zwillgen PLLC. Before that, she was the Civil Liberties Director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Jennifer practices, speaks and writes about computer crime and security, electronic surveillance, consumer privacy, data protection, copyright, trademark and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Read more » about Jennifer Granick
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Seeking Happily Ever After - Free Screening
By Elaine Adolfo • April 7, 2011 at 1:27 pm
Seeking Happily Ever After, a film in the Fair Use Project's Documentary Film Program, will be screened on Tuesday April 26 at 7pm at the Women's Community Center in Stanford, CA. This brand new feature-length documentary discusses the growing population of single 30-somethings in the US. More women are delaying marriage or choosing alternatives to marriage - this film explores why and what it means to be a 30-something woman today! Read more » about Seeking Happily Ever After - Free Screening
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Media Piracy in Emerging Economies
By Balazs Bodo • March 7, 2011 at 2:26 am
Media Piracy in Emerging Economies is a new, comprehensive study on the impact and role of piracy on/in some of the biggest developing countries: Brazil, Russia, India. The study is out: http://www.scribd.com/doc/50196972/MPEE-1-0-1
Follow the latest development at http://piracy.ssrc.org/From the Introduction:
Media piracy has been called “a global scourge,” “an international plague,” and “nirvana for criminals,”1 but it is probably better described as a global pricing problem. High prices for media goods, low incomes, and cheap digital technologies are the main ingredients of global media piracy. If piracy is ubiquitous in most parts of the world, it is because these conditions are ubiquitous. Relative to local incomes in Brazil, Russia, or South Africa, the price of a CD, DVD, or copy of Microsoft Office is five to ten times higher than in the United States or Europe. Licit media goods are luxury items in most parts of the world, and licit media markets are correspondingly tiny. Industry estimates of high rates of piracy in emerging markets—68% for software in Russia, 82% for music in Mexico, 90% for movies in India—reflect this disparity and may even understate the prevalence of pirated goods. Read more » about Media Piracy in Emerging Economies
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Anti-transparency
By Tom Rubin • February 8, 2011 at 9:25 am
Quoted verbatim from a recent DMCA takedown letter:
IMPORTANT NOTICE: None of the information contained in this legal notice is to be transmitted and/or released to any third party, including but not limited to Chilling Effects (chillingeffects.org), without the express written permission of the the copyright owner and or his agent. As stated in Section 512 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, and in the normal course of processing and notifying the infringing counter party, recipient must only include information specific to that counter party's infringement and must not include this entire notice. Any re-transmission in whole or in part of this legal notice by the intended recipient will be a direct violation of U.S. and International Copyright Law and will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law by the copyright owner.
Please also note that with the express permission of the copyright owner, in addition to being forwarded to certain members of the United States Congress and the U.S. Department of Justice, MiMTiD will send this legal notice to a third-party that aggregates repeat infringer data gathered by different agencies and infringement mitigation service companies around the globe and provides centralized access to that data to be used by global policy makers and law enforcement agencies to create and enforce copyright law. As such, this legal notice will included in The Chilling Report (http: //www.chillingreport.com). To obtain secure access to the Chilling Report please email The Chilling Report at xxxxx @chillingreport.com or call (713) xxx-xxxx.
This is a step in the opposite direction of optimizing copyright for the cloud, which was the subject of my remarks at the WIPO conference in November. Read more » about Anti-transparency
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Seeking Happily Ever After
By Documentary Film Program • February 3, 2011 at 11:33 am
This award-winning feature-length documentary details why there are more single 30-something women in the U.S. Read more » about Seeking Happily Ever After
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Golan v. Holder - Respondents Brief
Publication Date:August 11, 2011Publication Type:Litigation BriefSupreme Court brief for the Respondents. Read more » about Golan v. Holder - Respondents Brief
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Golan v. Holder - Justice and Freedom Fund's Supreme Court Amicus Brief in support of Golan
Publication Date:June 21, 2011Publication Type:Litigation Brief -
Golan v. Holder - American Library, et al. Supreme Court Amicus Brief in support of Golan
Publication Date:June 21, 2011Publication Type:Litigation BriefBRIEF AMICI CURIAE OF AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION, ASSOCIATION OF COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES, ASSOCIATION OF RESEARCH LIBRARIES, UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN DEAN OF LIBRARIES, INTERNET ARCHIVE AND WIKIMEDIA FOUNDATION IN SUPPORT OF PETITIONERS Read more » about Golan v. Holder - American Library, et al. Supreme Court Amicus Brief in support of Golan
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Golan v. Holder - Google, Inc. Supreme Court Amicus Brief in support of Golan
Publication Date:June 21, 2011Publication Type:Litigation Brief
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Vargas v. BT
We successfully defended Grammy-nominated American music producer, composer, and songwriter, Brain Transeau’s (better known by his stage name, BT), against spurious copyright infringement claims. Read more » about Vargas v. BT
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Fairey v. The Associated Press
We represented visual artist Shepard Fairey in connection with the AP’s claim that his iconic “Hope” poster in support of President Obama’s campaign infringes the AP’s copyrights. We represented Fairey because we believe his artistic transformation of a news photograph to convey a political message fell within the protection of the fair use doctrine and presented an important example of why fair use is essential for free expression. Read more » about Fairey v. The Associated Press
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Shloss v. Estate of Joyce
After the Estate of James Joyce refused to allow a scholar to quote Joyce in her book, we successfully defended her right under the fair use doctrine to use the quotes she needed to illustrate her scholarship. After we prevailed in the case, the Estate paid $240,000 of our client’s legal fees. Read more » about Shloss v. Estate of Joyce
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Brave New Films v. Savage
After Original Talk Radio Network, the nationwide distributor of Michael Savage’s radio show, issued a takedown notice against a video critical of Savage’s portrayal of Muslims, we filed a lawsuit that convinced the company to withdraw its objections to our client’s film. Read more » about Brave New Films v. Savage
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Your right to resell your own stuff is in peril
Date published:October 7, 2012“It would be absurd to say anything manufactured abroad can’t be bought or sold here,” said Marvin Ammori, a First Amendment lawyer and Schwartz Fellow at the New American Foundation who specializes in technology issues. Read more » about Your right to resell your own stuff is in peril
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Knockoff handbags, a big push to the fashion industry?
Date published:September 13, 2012 -
Must You Pay to Use Photos of Public Domain Artworks? No, Says a Legal Expert
Date published:September 12, 2012 -
Apple vs. Samsung: Is Copying Theft or Innovation?
Date published:September 4, 2012
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5/9: CIS Speaker Series: Tim Wu discusses his new book THE MASTER SWITCH (Past Event)
May 9, 2011Stanford Law School, Room 290Tim Wu is an author, policy advocate and author of The Master Switch. He is a professor at Columbia Law School, the chairman of media reform organization Free Press, and is working for the FTC as a senior advisor. Wu was recognized in 2006 as one of 50 leaders in science and technology by Scientific American magazine, and in 2007 Wu was listed as one of Harvard's 100 most influential graduates by 02138 magazine. Read more » about 5/9: CIS Speaker Series: Tim Wu discusses his new book THE MASTER SWITCH
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5/2: CIS Speaker Series - A Defensive Patent License Proposal (Past Event)
May 2, 2011Stanford Law SchoolUpdated 5/10/2011
Check out pictures from the CIS Speaker Series Talk - A Defensive Patent License Proposal Read more » about 5/2: CIS Speaker Series - A Defensive Patent License Proposal
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4/27: Intellectual Property and Individual Liberty: Friends or Foes (Past Event)
April 27, 2011Stanford Law SchoolAnthony Falzone and Mark Schultz will debate whether significant developments in U.S. copyright law protects or violates individual freedom. Falzone, Executive Director of the Fair Use Project and a Lecturer in Law at Stanford Law School, will evaluate the affects of copyright law on freedom of expression, while Prof. Schultz will assess the affects of copyright law on the liberty of IP creators and owners. Professor Paul Goldstein will moderate. Professor Paul Goldstein will moderate. Lunch will be served. Hosted by the Stanford Federalist Society Read more » about 4/27: Intellectual Property and Individual Liberty: Friends or Foes
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4/25: Copyright, Remix and the Art of Collaborative Media: A conversation with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Anthony Falzone (Past Event)
April 25, 2011Stanford Law SchoolUpdated April 27, 2011Check out photos from the Joseph Gordon-Levitt talk.
hitRECORD.org is a project Joseph Gordon-Levitt started almost five years ago. They have evolved into a professional open production company that creates and develops art and media collaboratively. Rather than just exhibiting and admiring each other's work as isolated individuals, they invite users to gather and collectively work on projects together. Read more » about 4/25: Copyright, Remix and the Art of Collaborative Media: A conversation with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Anthony Falzone
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Prof. Chris Sprigman - Hearsay Culture - Show #173 - KZSU-FM
October 16, 2012
CIS Affiliate Scholar David Levine interviews Prof. of Virginia Law, co-author of The Knockoff Economy. Read more » about Prof. Chris Sprigman - Hearsay Culture - Show #173 - KZSU-FM
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Prof. Madhavi Sunder - Hearsay Culture - Show #172 - KZSU-FM
September 19, 2012
CIS Affiliate Scholar David Levine interviews Prof. Madhavi Sunder of UC Davis School of Law, author of From Goods to a Good Life: Intellectual Property and Global Justice. Read more » about Prof. Madhavi Sunder - Hearsay Culture - Show #172 - KZSU-FM
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Mike Masnick - Hearsay Culture - Show #168 - KZSU-FM
August 10, 2012
CIS Affiliate Scholar David Levine interviews Mike Masnick of Techdirt. Read more » about Mike Masnick - Hearsay Culture - Show #168 - KZSU-FM
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Francesca Coppa and Tisha Turk - Hearsay Culture - Show #167 - KZSU-FM
August 10, 2012
CIS Affiliate Scholar David Levine interviews Profs. Francesca Coppa of Muhlenberg College and Tisha Turk of the University of Minnesota at Morris on vidding. Read more » about Francesca Coppa and Tisha Turk - Hearsay Culture - Show #167 - KZSU-FM