Singularity Law

First Epoch (1960-1969)1
Putting a date on when the field of computer law began is as difficult as putting a date on when the “modern” computer industry began. And yet the two fields are inexorably intertwined, and so, deciding when a “modern” computer was first used will provide us with the earliest possible date for [...]

What do law profs do in the summer when they are not teaching? Generally writing. This summer, in addition to a law review article, I am designing a legal wiki that will be devoted to the history of computer/IT law.
Many of the pioneers in the field have or are close to retiring. [...]

This is not a new issue, but one that has been reignited by a recent hacker competition to break into supposedly security computer systems. What is “responsible disclosure”? Well, consider the following scenario.
Don is a computer researcher that discovers a dangerous flaw in a popular computer operating system. Should he immediately disclose the [...]

What’s a lawyer to do? Your client tells you to send a nasty letter to Digg.com, demanding that it immediately take down an encryption key that can unlock the digital right management on HD-DVDs. You send the letter. Digg, “acting on advice of its lawyers,” complies. The CEO posts a notice on the [...]

Accepting the old adage, “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em,” some record labels are posting their own video clips on some of the very same P2P networks they claim are violating their copyrights. Suretone Records, a label of the Universal Music Group, with popular groups like Weezer and Drop Dead Gorgeous, is reported [...]

Viacom recently sued YouTube for copyright infringement, claiming a billion dollars in damages for unauthorized copies of its content posted on the popular website. Many observers suspect that the suit was filed by Viacom, not because it intends to litigate the matter through to judgment, but as a negotiating ploy to get a better licensing [...]

Last fall I posted an entry about how a student film my son and a friend had made almost three years ago was posted by someone on YouTube and Google Video and had become somewhat of an overnight hit (despite the obvious copyright infringements by such anonymous and unconsented postings). Since May there have been [...]

Search engines are good and getting better every day. I was made aware of that fact while preparing the last blog entry on the Viacom Takedown Notices. After preparing and posting the entry I decided that I should add a couple of links to it and repost it. So I went to [...]

The news media and blogosphere have been abuzz about the move by Viacom to have all of its content removed from YouTube. Viacom paid someone (and probably a lot of someone’s) to compile a list of 100K video clips on YouTube that arguably infringe its copyrights (I say “arguably” since news reports indicate that [...]

While preparing a proposal for a summer in London program on International Information Technology Law, I conducted a survey of U.S. law schools that have courses on computer, Internet or E-Commerce Law. While the titles vary widely, there appear to be around 150 law school offering such courses, and a total of 296 different [...]