Amazon has caved into demands from the Authors Guild that it disable the ability of the Kindle to read a book aloud. This is very bad news.

We had this battle before. In 2001, Adobe released e-book technology that gave rights holders (including publishers of public domain books) the ability to control whether the Adobe e-book reader read the book aloud. The story got famous when it was shown that one of its public domain works–“Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”–was marked to forbid the book to be read aloud….

Now the issue is back. The Authors Guild has objected because Amazon’s Kindle 2 has a function built in that enables the book to be read aloud. So when, for example, you’re commuting, you can plug your Kindle 2 into your MP3 jack and have the book read aloud.

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Economic growth requires innovation. Trouble is, Washington is practically designed to resist it. Built into the DNA of the most important agencies created to protect innovation is an almost irresistible urge to protect the most powerful instead. The FCC is a perfect example. Born in the 1930s, at a time when the utmost importance was put on stability, the agency has become the focal point for almost every important innovation in technology. It is the presumptive protector of the Internet, and the continued regulator of radio, TV and satellite communications. In the next decades, it could well become the default regulator for every new communications technology…

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In 2006, Thailand announced it was blocking access to YouTube for anyone with a Thai I.P. address, and then identified 20 offensive videos for Google to remove as a condition of unblocking the site. “If your whole game is to increase market share,” says Lawrence Lessig, speaking of Google, “it’s hard to…gather data in ways that don’t raise privacy concerns or in ways that might help repressive governments to block controversial content.”

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Concerns about DMCA [Digital Millennium Copyright Act] takedown abuse and fair use aren’t limited to Lawrence Lessig, the EFF, and Free Press—John McCain and Sarah Palin are going all mavericky on the issue as well. Yesterday, their campaign sent a letter to YouTube complaining about rights holders (especially news organizations) that filed illegitimate DMCA takedown notices and managed to have important campaign clips pulled at crucial times. The letter is yet more evidence of why human judgment—not just automated filtering or scanning—is crucial in such cases.

The letter opens by talking about how important YouTube has been for the campaign’s efforts to get out copies of commercials, speeches, etc., but notes that the site’s usefulness is being curtailed by “overreaching copyright claims.” Many of these claims have involved “fewer than 10 seconds of footage from news broadcasts in campaign ads or videos, as a basis for commentary on the issues presented in the news reports.”

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In early February 2007, Stephanie Lenz’s 13-month-old son started dancing. Pushing a walker across her kitchen floor, Holden Lenz started moving to the distinctive beat of a song by Prince, “Let’s Go Crazy.” He had heard the song before. The beat had obviously stuck. So when Holden heard the song again, he did what any sensible 13-month-old would do–he accepted Prince’s invitation and went “crazy” to the beat. Holden’s mom grabbed her camcorder and, for 29 seconds, captured the priceless image of Holden dancing, with the barely discernible Prince playing on a CD player somewhere in the background.

Ms. Lenz wanted her mother to see the film. But you can’t easily email a movie. So she did what any citizen of the 21st century would do: She uploaded the file to YouTube and sent her relatives and friends the link. They watched the video scores of times. It was a perfect YouTube moment: a community of laughs around a homemade video, readily shared with anyone who wanted to watch.

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On Aug. 14th, just 82 days before the general election, John McCain released his technology platform, an extraordinarily important document, if only because of the extraordinary importance technology has to the Nation’s economy. This platform touted John McCain’s experience. It described him as the former chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, a committee that plays a major role in the development of technology policy. And indeed for much of the last decade, John McCain has led the most important committee in Congress dealing with Internet and technology matters. But that experience, in my view, brings with it a certain responsibility. For the single most important fact about the Internet’s development over the last decade has been the extraordinary decline the United States has faced compared to our competitors.

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Congress is considering a major reform of copyright law intended to solve the problem of “orphan works” — those works whose owner cannot be found. This “reform” would be an amazingly onerous and inefficient change, which would unfairly and unnecessarily burden copyright holders with little return to the public.

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