The Elvis of Cyber Law - Lawrence Lessig

So Lawrence Lessig, the Elvis of CyberLaw, Professor of Law at Standford, author of Free Culture, gets onto Dead Beat.

"No offense. I too mourn the passing of Jack Valenti, but get with it you blogger and user of the internet (or abuser as Vanenti would tell you) he was a bit of a radical. Now, here's the thing you've got to remember. You've got to see this. This is the point. (And Jack Valenti misses this.) Here's the point: Never has it been more controlled ever. Take the addition, the changes, the copyrights turn, take the changes to copyrights scope, put it against the background of an extraordinarily concentrated structure of media, and you produce the fact that never in our history have fewer people controlled more of the evolution of our culture. Never.

Enter the Internet. Every act is a copy, which means all of these unregulated uses disappear. Presumptively, everything you do on your machine on the network is a regulated use. And now it forces us into this tiny little category of arguing about, "What about the fair uses? What about the fair uses?" I will say the word: To hell with the fair uses. What about the unregulated uses we had of culture before this massive expansion of control? Now, unregulated uses disappear, we argue about fair use, and they find a way to remove fair use, right?"

"Whoh, Lessig, you're shouting."

"Goddamn right!"