Judge argues for expanded copyright protection

Posted by Emily Dilling on July 2, 2009 at 5:06 AM

Federal appellate judge Richard Posner has advocated expanded copyright protection to ensure the future of journalism the Daily Online Examiner reported.

Posner's proposed modifications to copyright law would make news aggregation more difficult for sites such as Google that link to news stories without the consent of the owner of the content.

While news aggregation has been identified an important problem facing the newspaper industry and its survival, the idea of copyrighting and protecting information remains vague and controversial. In an article on TechDirt.com, Mike Masnick accuses Posner of forgetting "the downsides to greater IP protectionism" writing that he "seems to ignore it completely, while also brushing off the ability of other sources of information to step into the void created by newspapers."

The Examiner's article echoes these sentiments, stating "the prospect that one publication could have exclusive rights to publish facts it uncovered is also at odds with free speech principles."

In a post on his blog Posner maintains that expanded copyright protection "might be necessary to keep free riding on content financed by online newspapers from so impairing the incentive to create costly news-gathering operations."

For a previous article on this topic, visit our partner site, EditorsWeblog.org.