Not long ago, a friend wrote me to ask who I'd like to hear opine on the future of scientific inquiry. Without hesitating, I said Lawrence Lessig. Lessig is the author of the book Free Culture and the chair of Creative Commons (CC) (which just ended a wildly successful fundraising drive, exceeding its donation goal by 20%). One project that will continue happily under the CC umbrella is Science Commons, which aims to curb threats to scientific progress from intellectual property law. By that CC folk don't just mean patent wars over AIDS drugs in developing nations (though that's certainly something they care about), but problems that crop up here in the U.S., too.
Results tagged “intellectualproperty” from 60 Second Science
Science and Common(s) Sense
Think you "own" that level 73 sword in Warcraft? The US government is pretty sure you do too.
Last month, six content creators in Second Life filed suit against another user named Thomas Simon (or, as he's known in the virtual world, "Rase Kenzo") for allegedly duplicating and selling thousands of products inside Second Life. Yesterday, a judgment of consent was filed in the case, which means the content creators effectively win. Because the settlement refers to the virtual items as "merchandise," as soon as the judge enters the settlement and makes it all official, the US government will have officially recognized virtual property.
