Valenti Redux, by Tim Wu
Tim Wu has a long list of idiotic quotes by Jack Valenti on Lawrence Lessig’s blog. I particularly like
On the VCR, 1983
“We are facing a very new and a very troubling assault … and we are facing it from a thing called the video cassette recorder and its necessary companion called the blank tape.
We are going to bleed and bleed and hemorrhage, unless this Congress at least protects one industry … whose total future depends on its protection from the savagery and the ravages of this machine [the VCR].”
and the incredibly idiotic…
On the public domain, 1995
“A public domain work is an orphan. No one is responsible for its life. But everyone exploits its use, until that time certain when it becomes soiled and haggard, barren of its previous virtues. How does the consumer benefit from the steady decline of a film’s quality?”
It is a good thing for Jack and his constituents that the Supreme Court didn’t buy his hyperbole: they would have missed out on the exploitation of a powerful new market for their creative works. As for public domain works, there is no lack of potential parents who are eager to adopt such orphans.
I suspect the world would be better if that percentage were even greater.
Apparently 15% of all web traffic is cat related. There's no reason for Brainwagon be any different.
Thanks Mal! I'm trying to reclaim the time that I was using doom scrolling and writing pointless political diatribes on…
Brainwagons back! I can't help you with a job, not least because I'm on the other side of our little…
Congrats, glad to hear all is well.