Professor Lessig on S115. Criticism of Lessig's criticism. And more, by Miller. I think the back and forth is happening because of the proposal was ambivalent in the true dictionary sense of the word, pulled in two directions. On the one hand, putting all the rights in one place is clearly the right decision in this world of online stores. On the other, replacing a mechanism for compulsory licenses with a voluntary one, without counterbalancing this by reducing the monopoly power (Peters' one-MRO-per-work requirement), is a net negative.

MS adopts a CC license, and Lessig isn't surprised. I sure am, though. CC licenses really are an amazing concept, although they're deviously simple. Just like the GPL, they use the existing laws to release rights, and provide a hint that, as much as the battle is against Congress passing more stupid laws, it's really a culture war first and foremost. The Broadcast Flag victory (for now) certainly makes it clearer than ever that as long as enabling technologies are given enough time to become entrenched, the freedom to tinkerers will have a broad enough base to preserve fair uses present and uses future.

Have a bunch more links which I'll add later tonight, and then it's probably no more until after Grokster; trying to give Joel a clear summary of the case, as much as will be possible between Western blots.

--Ari