Skip to Content
Uncategorized

Larry Lessig on Escaping the Country of the Blind (O’Reilly E-Tech, Part 4)

I’m back in San Francisco now after four overstimulating days at the O’Reilly Emerging Technology conference. One of the things that made the conference so enjoyable was the rock-star lineup of speakers, including Danny Hillis, George Dyson, Neil Gershenfeld, Cory…
March 18, 2005

I’m back in San Francisco now after four overstimulating days at the O’Reilly Emerging Technology conference. One of the things that made the conference so enjoyable was the rock-star lineup of speakers, including Danny Hillis, George Dyson, Neil Gershenfeld, Cory Doctorow, Clay Shirky, James Surowiecki, Chris Anderson, and (as an added surprise) Jeff Bezos. But the slickest talk of the week by far was given by Larry Lessig, Stanford law professor and de facto intellectual leader of the movement to undo the effects of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Lessig gave the morning keynote speech on Thursday (March 17). He compared Congress and the Big Media companies to the blind villagers in the H.G. Wells story “The Country of the Blind,” who decide that the only way to stop a sighted visitor’s misbehavior is to remove his eyes. His point being that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and other, even more draconian proposals for controlling the technologies of digital distribution are threatening to undermine our historic right to “remix” elements of our culture into new creations.

I took fairly complete notes on Lessig’s speech, which he’s also given at several other conferences recently. Again, because the notes are too long to present here in the TR blog, I’ve posted them at my personal blog.

Keep Reading

Most Popular

DeepMind’s cofounder: Generative AI is just a phase. What’s next is interactive AI.

“This is a profound moment in the history of technology,” says Mustafa Suleyman.

What to know about this autumn’s covid vaccines

New variants will pose a challenge, but early signs suggest the shots will still boost antibody responses.

Human-plus-AI solutions mitigate security threats

With the right human oversight, emerging technologies like artificial intelligence can help keep business and customer data secure

Next slide, please: A brief history of the corporate presentation

From million-dollar slide shows to Steve Jobs’s introduction of the iPhone, a bit of show business never hurt plain old business.

Stay connected

Illustration by Rose Wong

Get the latest updates from
MIT Technology Review

Discover special offers, top stories, upcoming events, and more.

Thank you for submitting your email!

Explore more newsletters

It looks like something went wrong.

We’re having trouble saving your preferences. Try refreshing this page and updating them one more time. If you continue to get this message, reach out to us at customer-service@technologyreview.com with a list of newsletters you’d like to receive.