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Lessig's actions in the past several years have been a major disappointment. I admired his work in pushing the copyright case (Eldred v. Ashcroft) all the way t
by 13thLetter 11y ago
Lessig's actions in the past several years have been a major disappointment. I admired his work in pushing the copyright case (Eldred v. Ashcroft) all the way to the Supreme Court. Even though he lost, that at least got the issue into the media a little bit, something no one else has managed; that's something that could have been built upon.
But instead of building on that and (for example) working with tech indistries to lobby for more sensible copyright legislation, he decided to go after a far more enormous and difficult task of somehow reforming the entire election system, something which I have to wonder if he even has any particular qualifications or experience to do. Then he decided that the way to accomplish that was to run for President, which is generally taken by the media and most people who follow politics as the sign of a crank. And now that's evaporated, as one would have expected, and we're back where we started. No Presidency, certainly no election law reform, and the same old awful copyright laws getting worse all the time.
- zeckalpha 11y agoHe tried lobbying for sensible copyright legislation. The problem was campaign finance. Hence the pivot.
- 13thLetter 11y agoThat's like pivoting from "I was unable to climb this mountain" to "I'll tear down this mountain with my bare hands." He switched from something achievable that he was qualified for to something immensely more difficult that he had no experience in. What's the result of that been? And, you know. Even if Citizens United is overturned (hooray! It'll once again be illegal to make a movie critical of Hillary Clinton during an election! Joyous day!) Lessig's contribution to that is zero; that's going wherever it's going with or without him. It would have been better for all of us if he'd stuck with copyright where he could have made a difference.
- zeckalpha 11y agoIt's more like "I was unable to climb this mountain because I couldn't breathe" to "Let's pack oxygen tanks".
- 13thLetter 11y agoNo, I like my simile better. Nothing and nobody will stop you from bringing oxygen tanks on your climb, and learning to use them is relatively straightforward. Changing the system of campaign finance in the United States, on the other hand, requires navigating dozens of immensely complex special interests, will be opposed by one or both major parties, and we haven't even gotten to what the courts might say yet. It's hard.
- zeckalpha 11y agoSounds like Lesterland.