Copyright and D.C. lobbying: that was fast

The House Republican Study Committee calls for reconsideration of over-restrictive copyright law, then un-calls for it a day later [TechDirt, rueful update; Alex Tabarrok]

P.S. And check out this upcoming Dec. 6 Cato discussion of the newly published Copyright Unbalanced: From Incentive To Excess (Mercatus Center; Jerry Brito, ed.)

One Comment

  • Congress should pass an “Internet free library national policy act,” establishing the eventual objective that anyone with a computer link anywhere in the country should have the same access to information as a physical visitor to the Library of Congress.

    As an initial step in line with that policy, Congress could rule that a bona-fide search data-base (eg. Google’s) is not a copyright infringement.

    Over the longer term, Congress might authorize a friendly expropriation of Google’s scanning library, to deploy the negotiating power of the US government against excessive demands by copyright trolls.