copyright....

“Some contemporary commentators incline to the view that the long history of the copyright may be coming to an end. That will be a question for the twenty-first century.” This quotation comes from the end of the John Feather reading, but I think it is also a good summary of the film we watched in class, and much of this week’s readings. It is an intriguing question, and at this point it is impossible to answer.
Personally, I’m pretty divided on the issue. The Internet is so vast I’m not really sure how anyone could hope to police the issue of copyright. And laws lose validity when people start ignoring them. At the same time, there is a lot of money in book (and film, and album) sales. I find it hard to believe that the twenty-first century is going to usher in an age of completely free information and artistic expression. Lars Ulrich of Metallica is kind of a jerk, but I agree with him that someone is going to be making money off of these products, somehow. As I said, I’m pretty divided on the issue, but it will be interesting to see what happens.