The INDUCE Act

I’m a couple days behind on reading blogs, and only today got to Lessig’s blog. He points out that Senator Hatch has introduced something called the INDUCE Act that will “criminalize the act of inducing another to commit a copyright violation.”

What kind of a country do we live in, that continues to criminalize behavior that in other contexts would be seen as not only appropriate, but authentically creative? I've written before in here about several issues to do with copyright, but it is perhaps important to remember that in the US right now copyright exists for an almost infinite period of time. Lessig makes these arguments much more clearly than I can, and with better examples. It's definitely worth keeping up with the issues. And now more than ever, since it also appears that this act (which includes a massive new regulatory program) might happen without public hearings, and even be passed in the next couple of weeks.

For more details about the act, and ideas about how to contest it, the Electronic Frontier Foundation is a good source.