6 Lawrence Lessig Quotes on Regulation

Lawrence Lessig quotes on regulation

17. That free culture was carried to America; that was our birth - 1790. We established a regime that left creativity unregulated. Now it was unregulated because copyright law only covered 'printing.' Copyright law did not control derivative work. And copyright law granted this protection for the limited time of 14 years.

22. We have a massive system to regulate creativity. A massive system of lawyers regulating creativity as copyright law has expanded in unrecognizable forms, going from a regulation of publishing to a regulation of copying.

23. Law and technology produce, together, a kind of regulation of creativity we've not seen before.

27. It's insane. It's extreme. It's controlled by political interests. It has no justification in the traditional values that justify legal regulation. And we've done nothing about it. We're bigger than they are. We've got rights on our side. And we've done nothing about it. We let them control this debate. Here's the refrain that leads to this: They win because we've done nothing to stop it.

34. Overregulation stifles creativity. It smothers innovation. It gives dinosaurs a veto over the future. It wastes the extraordinary opportunity for a democratic creativity that digital technology enables. In addition to these important harms, there is one more that was important to our forebears, but seems forgotten today. Overregulation corrupts citizens and weakens the rule of law. The war that is being waged today is a war of prohibition. As with every war of prohibition, it is targeted against the behavior of a very large number of citizens. According to The New York Times, 43 million Americans downloaded music in May 2002. According to the RIAA, the behavior of those 43 million Americans is a felony. We thus have a set of rules that transform 20 percent of America into criminals.

51. The law should regulate in certain areas of culture - but it should regulate culture only where that regulation does good. Yet lawyers rarely test their power, or the power they promote, against this simple pragmatic question: 'Will it do good?' When challenged about the expanding reach of the law, the lawyer answers, 'Why not?' We should ask, 'Why?' Show me why your regulation of culture is needed. Show me how it does good. And until you can show me both, keep your lawyers away.