Author: Laurence Kaye
Laurence Kaye (www.laurencekaye.com) is an IP & Digital Media Consultant. Drawing on his experience working as a leading digital lawyer since the 1980s, he now acts as a consultant to a wide range of digital businesses. He is also a consultant with Shoosmiths LLP. Email laurie@laurencekaye.com. Twitter @laurencekaye.
Brexit, copyright and liminality
I’ve always liked the word “liminality” – a threshold that marks the boundary between two phases. If nothing else, Brexit presents an opportunity for its appropriate use. The UK’s current state, where we are still in the EU but apparently heading somewhere else, does feel liminal, with its quality (to quote Wikipedia) of ambiguity or disorientation. You can sense […]
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Copyright, fair use and the advance of culture
The problem with a lot of the debate about copyright is that it becomes polarised. It’s “big media” v the “little guy”. It’s “closed copyright, a barrier to innovation” v “open internet, cultural advancement and freedom of expression”. It’s bad guy, good guy. It’s also not unusual to read that the absence of a “fair […]
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The digital shift – themes shaping the legal agenda
The first industrial revolution, which began in the 1750s, lasted for between 80 to 100 years. The pace of technological change today encourages us to believe that the second industrial revolution (IR2) will be completed at much greater speed. So if we take the mid-1980s as a starting point, with the emergence of optical disk […]
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Can copyright adapt to the digital age?
The copyright “paradox” Copyright works, created by professionals and amateurs alike, are ubiquitous on the network, on social media platforms, websites and online services. In June this year, the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) and Imperial College published new estimates of investment in the UK’s copyright industries, of which the publishing industry is a significant part. […]
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Digital media law highlights of 2009
Copyright, in various guises, has featured heavily in the media this year, being in the spotlight at both legislative and judicial level, with high profile decisions in UK and EU courts, and numerous papers, reports, consultations and reviews at UK and EU level. In addition, developments in consumer expectations, business models, and technological innovations have […]
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Digital media and the law
“Law 2.0”, “digital media law”. Great tag lines but is it all “sound and fury”, signifying nothing new? After all, there are plenty of examples of how existing laws are being applied to the online world. Are the law and Web 2.0 an odd couple fated to be forever out of sync? Alternatively, are we […]
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