You Say Czar, I say Tsar

Joe Biden was prattling on the other night to the Hollywood crowd about how Obama would be appointing the “right person” as the Copyright Czar required by the newly minted intellectual property bill. I find this highly unlikely. Primarily because the right person would recognize how outdated and abused our current IP laws are.

When significant portions of the population routinely ignore laws and don’t feel they are doing anything wrong, the solution is rarely more vigilant enforcement. The reality is that the Internet has enabled the sharing of content (writing, music, photos, movies, ideas, etc.) in a way unconceived of when the IP laws were written. All too often we lose focus on the real reason IP laws were created in the first place. They exist to encourage innovation. Period. They do not exist to protect anyone’s rights, or to assure anyone’s profit margin. But today, copyrights and patents are largely used for exactly the opposite effect. They are used as weapons to stifle innovation by shutting down or extracting profit from competitors.

However, much like health care, the notion of any actual reform taking place around IP is small. The lobbying forces defending the current system are strong. They have enormous financial incentive to keep the status quo in place. In light of that reality, I hope the “right person” for the new Czar is just a milquetoast ineffective toothless bureaucrat.

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