6.805/6.805/STS085 Calendar

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Fall Semester, 2002

MIT 6.805/6.806/STS085: Ethics and Law on the Electronic Frontier

Week of class on Oct. 3

Odds and ends

Hal's IP intro lecture from last week (PPT format).
In order to do this week's rotisserie on Eldred v. Ashcroft, you'll need to read the Brief for the petitioners and the Brief for the respondent (the government).

In class this week

This week we'll be continuing our look at copyright law with a detailed discussion of fair use and, especially, the Sony betamax case.

Readings to do before class:

Sony Corporation of America v. Universal City Studios, 464 US 417 (1984). This is a long, complex decision, but read it carefully. Pay particular attention to Justice Blackmun's dissent, and to the various intepretations of fair use. Note that the Court's ruling here was 5 to 4.

Kelley v. Arriba Soft Corp., 77. Supp.2d 1116, (C.D. Cal. 1999). This is a more recent fair use case, involving internet search engines. Notice how the decision explictly goes through the various factors cited in 17 USC section 106, in order to perform a fair use analysis. The ruling also discusses the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which we won't be looking at until next week.

Continue reading Litman's Digital Copyright: Protecting Intellectual Property on the Internet, through chapter 9 (page 150).