Category Archives: eye

The response to my channel changing has been overwhelming — literally, with the emails and well wishes. Thank you (and I’m sorry for the slowness in responding). Some have asked whether this means all IP disappears from here, or elsewhere, as of now. Answer: No. I’ve still got a bunch of things in the pipes (an op-ed in the Post; a couple more Internet Policy videos, a book, and some committed talks), as well as a cert petition in Kahle that would be much clarified if the 10th Circuit decided Golan.
Meanwhile, thanks again for the kind words, and many great ideas. Continue reading →

During my keynote at the iCommons iSummit 07, I made an announcement that surprised some, but which, from reports on the web at least, was also not fully understood by some. So here again is the announcement, with some reasoning behind it.
The bottom line: I have decided to shift my academic work, and soon, my activism, away from the issues that have consumed me for the last 10 years, towards a new set of issues. Why and what are explained in the extended entry below. Continue reading →

Following the good practice of others, and following suggestions of inconsistency by others, I offer the following disclosure statement.

How I make money
I am a law professor. I am paid to teach and write in fields that interest me. Never is my academic research directed by anyone other than I. I am not required to teach any particular course; I am never required or even asked by anyone with authority over me to write about a particular subject or question. I am in this important sense a free laborer.
I also get paid for some of my writing. I write books that are sold commercially. Three (and I hope soon all) of my books are also available freely in electronic form. I have been commissioned to write articles for magazines. But in all cases, while I may contract about the subject matter I will address, I never contract about the substance.
I have (though rarely) been paid to consult on matters related to my work. If I have, I conform my behavior to the NC Principle articulated below.
I am sometimes paid to speak. If I am, I will contract as to subject matter (e.g., whether the speech is about innovation, or copyright, or privacy, etc.). I do not contract as to substance. In addition to an honorarium, I also accept payment to cover travel expenses.
I am not compensated for my work with nonprofits.
Tech
I am a paying customer of Movable Type. Marc Perkel gives me a great hosting deal. If ever anyone sends me a product to review, I am resolved not to write about it.
Business Attachments
I have no regular clients. I am on board of a number of non-profits, including EFF, FSF, PLOS, FreePress, PublicKnowledge, and Creative Commons.
I serve on no commercial boards. I don’t take stock-options to serve on boards or advisory boards.
The Non-Corruption (NC) Principle
It is a special privilege that I have a job that permits me to say just what I believe, and not what I’m paid to say. That freedom used to be the norm among professionals. It is less and less the norm today. Lawyers at one time had a professional ethic that permitted them to say what they believe. Now the concept of “business conflicts” — meaning, a conflict with the commercial interests of actual or potential clients — silences many from saying what they believe. Doctors too are hired into jobs where they are not allowed to discuss certain medical procedures (See, e.g., Rust v. Sullivan). Researchers at “think tanks” learn who the funders are as a first step to deciding what questions will be pursued. And finally, and most obviously, the same is true of politicians: The constant need to raise money just to keep their job drives them to develop a sixth sense about what sorts of statements (whether true or not) will cost them fundraising dollars.
With perhaps one exception (politicians), no one forces professionals into this compromise. (The exception is because I don’t see how you survive in politics, as the system is, without this compromise, unless you are insanely rich.) We choose the values we live by ourselves. And as the freedom I have to say what I believe is the most important part of my job to me, I have chosen a set of principles that limit any link between money and the views I express.
I call these principles “non-corruption” principles because I believe that behavior inconsistent with these principles, at least among professionals, is a kind of corruption. Obviously, I don’t mean “corruption” in the crudest sense. Everyone would agree that it is wrong for a global warming scientist to say to Exxon, “if you pay me $50,000, I’ll write an article criticizing global warming.” That is not the sort of “corruption” I am talking about.
I mean instead “corruption” in a more subtle sense. We all understand that subtle sense when we look at politicians. We don’t recognize it enough when we think about lawyers, doctors, scientists, and professors.
I want to increase this recognition, even at the risk of indirectly calling some of my friends “corrupt.” Norms are uncertain here. I hope they change. But until they change, we should not condemn those with differing views. We should engage them. I intend this to be the beginning of that engagement.
So, the NC principle:
The simple version is just this: I don’t shill for anyone.
The more precise version is this: I never recommend as policy a position that I have been paid, either directly or indirectly, to recommend.
The precise version need to be precisely specified, but much can be understood from its motivation: “Corruption” in my view is the subtle pressure to take views or positions because of the financial reward they will bring you. “Subtle” in the sense that one’s often not even aware of the influence. (This is true, I think, of most politicians.) The rule is thus designed to avoid even that subtle force.
So: “I never recommend as policy a position“: This is meant to distinguish work as a lawyer from work as an advocate. I don’t do legal work for money. But everyone understands that when a lawyer speaks for his client, he speaks for his client. The corruption I am targeting is a lawyer or academic speaking not for a client, but presumptively, for the truth. And “recommend” means in any public forum — so an op-ed, testimony, or a lecture.
“that I have been paid directly“: This is the easy part of the principle. “Directly” means that I’ve received cash or other such compensation, or that I receive research support, or funding that I otherwise wouldn’t have been entitled to.
“or indirectly“: This is a harder line to draw in general. The boundaries for me, however, seem pretty clear. In my view, I would be “indirectly” benefited if an institution I was responsible for got a significant benefit from an easily identified interest.
So, for example, I do no fundraising for my law school. My position, and the Center I run there, depends in no way upon my raising funds for either. Further, the commitment I have from my dean to support the Center is independent of any fundraising. As Dean Sullivan told me when she recruited me, “fundraising is my problem. Yours is to do the work.”
Thus, if you give a substantial amount of money to Stanford, you don’t, in my view, indirectly benefit me — because you have not made my life any different from how it was before you gave that money. (Indeed, given the hassle that usually runs with such gifts, you’ve likely made my life more difficult.)
Creative Commons presents a different question. A substantial contribution to Creative Commons — an entity which, as its CEO, I am responsible for — would, consistent with the NC principle, limit my ability to “recommend as policy a position” that was directly connected to the contributing entity.
So far, beyond the foundation grants CC has received, there have been two such “substantial” contributions to Creative Commons. With neither would I ever “recommend as policy a position” that benefited either — even if I believed, independently, that the position was correct. This doesn’t mean I wouldn’t help such people, or advise them. It simply means I would not publicly say something about their position, after such support was received.
I acknowledge one might well quibble with the “substantial” qualification here. Why not “any” rather than “substantial”? That may be the right position, at least ultimately. But as I view the matter now, the gifts beyond these two are so small as a proportion of CC’s budget that they don’t meaningfully change my work for CC at all.
But isn’t disclosure enough?
Some would say this principle is too strict. That a simpler rule — indeed the rule that governs in most of these contexts — simply requires disclosure.
I don’t agree with the disclosure principle. In my view, it is too weak. The best evidence that it is too weak is the United States Congress. All know, or can know, who gives what to whom. That hasn’t chilled in the least the kind of corruption that I am targeting here. More generally: if everyone plays this kind of corruption game, then disclosure has no effect in stopping the corruption I am targeting. Thus, in my view, it is not enough to say that “Exxon funded this research.” In my view, Exxon should not be directly funding an academic to do research benefiting Exxon in a policy dispute.
(There is a difficult line here that turns upon practice. When I was at Chicago, professors received summer research grants. Those were awarded by the Dean. To make the funders happy, the professor would write “this research was supported by a grant by XXX.” But never was the money given in light of the work, and most of the time, it wasn’t till after you had finished something that you discovered who had “funded” the work. I don’t mean to be targeting this sort of behavior at all. Again, the funding the professor received was independent of the grant by XXX.)
What the NC principle is not
The NC principle is about money. It is not about any other influence. Thus, if you’re nice to me, no doubt, I’ll be nice to you. If you’re respectful, I’ll be respectful back. If you flatter me, I doubt I could resist flattering you in return. If you push causes I believe in, I will likely push your work as well. These forms of influence are not within the scope of the NC principle because none of them involve money. I mean the NC principle only to be about removing the influence of money from the work of a professional. I don’t think there’s any need to adopt a rule to remove these other influences.
Why is money different from flattery, or being a liberal? Good question. Lots of obvious reasons. (For example, think about how hard these other “corruption principles” would be to implement: “I can’t support X because he supports the Democratic party, as I do.” “I can’t testify in favor of Y because its President said something nice about me.” Talk about perverse incentives…)
Someday I hope time will give me the opportunity to say more about why in depth. But for now, I mean only to specify the scope of my principle: It is a principle about isolating one form of influence from the work that I (and I hope my colleagues) do. We (in legal academics, and imho) get paid enough not to have to worry about selling testimony.
Thus, one friend wrote me with disappointment about something I wrote that could be viewed as a favor to someone else. So long as money is not involved, I’m all for this kind of favor. We should be doing favors for people we agree with all the time. Especially people on our side of the debate: we need to become at least as good as the other side in cultivating a community of support.
So what does all this promise?
If you believe I am following my principle, then you can still believe I am biased because I’m a liberal, or wrong because I’m an idiot, or overly attentive because I’m easily flattered, or under-attentive because I punish people who behave badly. All that the NC principle promises is that I am not saying what I am saying because of money.
As applied
I have been living these principles for many years. So my purpose here is not to announce any new policy. You can agree or disagree with the principles. You can believe them too strict, or not strict enough. They are significantly stricter than anything within the academy just now. No doubt, many may believe they are way too strict.
But whether you believe them too strict, or not strict enough, I would encourage you to engage them. Consistent with my NC principle, I will reward kindness and insight with at least kindness. I will ignore people whose argument style stopped developing in high school. But because this is an issue I very much want to continue to work on, the only thing for sure is I won’t accept money to consult around it. (And of course, there are millions throwing hundreds of millions at me to do this, so this is a REAL sacrifice.)
Finally, and again, I don’t offer this as a tool to condemn. I offer it because I believe this is a conversation we all should have. Continue reading →

Teo Elias Neuefeind Lessig

Or so say his parents.
His brother insists his name is “Appletree Alex.” Continue reading →

Willem got a brother yesterday. Mother is amazing. Father is amazed. Continue reading →

So Code v2 is officially launched today. Some may remember Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace, published in 1999. Code v2 is a revision to that book — not so much a new book, as a translation of (in Internet time) a very old book. Part of the update was done on a Wiki. The Wiki was governed by a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license. So too is Code v2.

Thus, at http://codev2.cc, you can download the book. Soon, you can update it further (we’re still moving it into a new wiki). You can also learn a bit more about the history of the book, and aim of the revision. And finally, there are links to buy the book — more cheaply than you likely can print it yourself.

Most important, however, as we come to the $185,000 mark of the CC fundraiser: All royalties from Code v2 go to Creative Commons, in recognition of the work done by those who helped with the wiki version of Code v1. Continue reading →

I’m sorry I lost the blog for about 12 hours. Continue reading →

There’s a great line in Gore’s movie about how he thinks about the process of making presentations. Each time, he says, he goes through the presentation “removing blocks” — trying to understand where people aren’t understanding what he’s saying, and changing it so there is understanding. Sometimes it’s not possible, of course — sometimes there’s just disagreement. But sometime disagreement is just misunderstanding.

As I read some of the responses to my post about Web 2.0, I’m beginning to have a Gore moment. I used the word “ethics”; that word is creating a block. Many read that word (reasonably, of course) to suggest I’m trying to impose a moral code on the the Web; distinguish good from bad, right from wrong; a kind of PCism for PCs.

That’s a totally reasonably way to read what I wrote. It’s not, however, the point of the post. I don’t have a moral code to impose on the Web. I was instead describing the elements, as I see them, of a successful Web 2.0 business. My argument is not “do X because it is good”; my post was “do X to keep and spread the success you’ve had.” My claim is not that walled gardens never prosper (see, e.g., AOL). It is that walled gardens wither (see, e.g., AOL), at least in the environment of Web 2.0.

It was clumsy to try to frame that point as a point about ethics. I realize in reading the responses, I hang the normative within “morals”; ethics, in my (private?) language, is about how we (differing depending upon the group) behave. So in that sense, it was how Web 2.0 companies behave, not because god told them to (remember: amoral), but because they believe this is how best to behave.

But there’s another set of responses I don’t think there’s a simple way to answer. There’s a certain mindset out there that thinks the way the world was cut up in college is the way the world is. So whatever set of texts you read as a sophomore, somehow they define the nature of world forever. Seared in your brain is the excitement of figuring out the difference between Capitalism and Marxism, or communitarianism vs. libertarianism. And so significant was this moment of education that everything else in life must be ordered according to these sophomore frames.

I don’t know the best way to respond to this sort of soul. Obama apparently addresses it in the context of politics, when he comments that the last 3 presidential elections have all been framed in terms of the debates of the 1960s (Vietnam, the sexual revolution, etc.), and the best response to this framing is just to move on.

That’s what I wish would happen here. Put your college philosophy books away, and start reading research about what’s happening now. Understand it first, then craft the label. Because when you understand what, say, von Hippel is writing about, it has absolutely nothing to do with communism/communalism/communitarianism/commuwhatever-you-want. It’s all about how business prosper in a new technological environment. There’s a good argument (indeed, great books) skeptical about whether there is a new technological environment. Fair enough. But there are also businesses “democratizing innovation” (free PDF here) not because they’re a bunch of communapinkos, and not because they miss the Cultural Revolution. Continue reading →

So my family and I have arrived at the American Academy in Berlin where I’ll be spending the year writing and hiding (mainly). (More on the hiding part later). My 3 year old (as of Thursday!) seems not to have as flexible an internal clock as his dad. This is the first morning he’s slept past 2am. I should have polled for tricks for dealing with this in advance. Continue reading →

So I’m leaving for Berlin for the year Monday. I am on sabbatical, and need to write tons of stuff. I will be changing significantly how I connect (project: privatizing lessig), but one thing I really need to do is to find a web master. I want to do much more in this space, but this space needs some significant reworking. If you’re interested and able, please email Lauren Gelman at the Stanford CIS. There’s some money to support this, but not much. Continue reading →