Academic Writing

Chain-Link Confidentiality

Author(s): 
Woodrow Hartzog
Publication Date: 
April 24, 2012
Publication Type: 
Academic Writing

Disclosing personal information online often feels like losing control over one’s data forever; but this loss is not inevitable. This essay proposes a “chain-link confidentiality” approach to protecting online privacy. One of the most difficult challenges to guarding privacy in the digital age is the protection of information once it is exposed to other people. A chain-link confidentiality regime would contractually link the disclosure of personal information to obligations to protect that information as the information moves downstream. Read more » about Chain-Link Confidentiality

The Social Layer of Freedom of Information Law

Author(s): 
David Levine
Publication Date: 
March 1, 2012
Publication Type: 
Academic Writing

It is now received wisdom that a properly functioning democracy requires transparency and accountability — information shared with the public that allows the public to know what its government is doing. It is equally uncontroversial to say that social media allows for an unprecedented amount of informal but structured dissemination and analysis of information. Despite these two basic points, U.S. freedom of information law has failed to harness the power of these new social media networks and, more importantly, formats in a way that amplifies public knowledge of government information. Read more » about The Social Layer of Freedom of Information Law

Valuing Attribution and Publication in Intellectual Property

Author(s): 
Christopher Sprigman
Publication Date: 
February 27, 2012
Publication Type: 
Academic Writing

This is the third in a series of articles focusing on the experimental economics of intellectual property. In earlier work, we have experimentally studied the ways in which creators assign monetary value to the things that they create. That research has suggested that creators are subject to a systematic bias that leads them to overvalue their work. Read more » about Valuing Attribution and Publication in Intellectual Property

A Legitimate Interest in Promoting the Progress of Science: Constitutional Constraints on Copyright Laws

Author(s): 
David Olson
Publication Date: 
October 13, 2011
Publication Type: 
Academic Writing

The Supreme Court certified two questions in Golan v. Holder: (1) Does section 514 of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (“URAA”) violate the Progress Clause of the Constitution? (2) Does the URAA violate the First Amendment? This Essay argues that section 514 violates the Progress Clause’s requirement that copyright laws “promote the Progress of Science.” This is because the statute bequeaths copyright status without in return achieving any net increase in the creation or dissemination of creative works. Read more » about A Legitimate Interest in Promoting the Progress of Science: Constitutional Constraints on Copyright Laws

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