How Creativity Is Being Strangled by the Law

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Harvard professor Larry Lessig has become a true hero to artists, authors, scientists, coders, and opiners everywhere as one of the founding authorities on copyright issues. As corporate interests have sought to rein in the forces of Napster and YouTube, Lessig has fought back, appearing recently before the U.S. Supreme Court to extend copyright protection from 50 to 70 years. The net's most celebrated lawyer, Lessig chairs Creative Commons, a nuanced, free licensing scheme for individual creators, and is also the founder of the Center for Internet and Society. "Lessig has built a reputation as the king of Internet law and as the most important next-wave thinker on intellectual property," says New York Magazine. In this TEDTalk, he cites John Philip Sousa, celestial copyrights, and the "ASCAP cartel" in his argument for reviving our creative culture.