[Editor Charlie sez: Our old nemesis Lawrence Lessig is pressed back into service to lead Google’s charge against justice for pre-72 recording artists. True to form, Lessig trots out his own opinions about copyright masquerading as law–opinions that have been shot down twice by the US Supreme Court as Neil Turkewitz teaches us. Ever the victim, Lessig gets cranky when he’s called on it.]

My issue with Larry Lessig is that he is fighting to preserve injustice while claiming to represent the public interest, and that he has such little regard for the truth. Like most zealots, he believes that the ends justify the means. And since the ends he seeks are, from his perspective, so important, they justify extreme means. I find fault with both his desired ends, and with the modalities he is prepared to adopt in pursuit thereof. His defense of the worst aspects of the exploitation economy are both incomprehensible and inexcusable.

Let’s explore. On May 18, Larry Lessig published an article in Wired entitled: CONGRESS’ LATEST MOVE TO EXTEND COPYRIGHT PROTECTION IS MISGUIDED. In it, Lessig sets out the World According to Lessig, (hereafter referred to as WAL), and boy does it bear little similarity to the world the rest of sentient life occupies. Lessig was responding to a bill passed by the House of Representatives and currently in the Senate entitled CLASSICS that would address a gap in federal law that allows certain music services to avoid paying performers and labels for music created prior to February 15, 1972 (the date when federal copyright law first protected sound recordings). Now I say he was “responding,” to the legislation, but that is a bit generous, since his criticisms suggest that he in fact did not read the legislation, or more importantly, take the time to understand the surrounding legal environment in which the legislation is situated. And of course, it goes without saying that Lessig was unmoved by the actual injustice of the present situation.

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