Freeing the Mouse
One of the better beat reporters covering the Supreme Court, Linda Greenhouse of The New York Times, says that Lawrence Lessig faced an uphill battle to convince a generally sympathetic court that extending copyright was not only a bad idea but unconstitutional. I don’t think it bodes well for a case that’s lost at every level, but I still hope for a positive outcome. It’s been interesting to see in coverage elsewhere that a lot of reporters are saying that Mickey Mouse as a character would still be protected under trademark law, so that it wouldn’t be possible for others to use him in egregiously harmful ways, which is something I thought was probably the case. But saying that you want to free the mouse is a great slogan, so there you go.
Other blogs are covering today’s arguments before the court much better than I ever could. I’ll just point to this item on Doc Searls’ blog that has pointers that will get you to most of the other important stuff.
Posted at 6:15 PM