Ability to inline different media-types and parts of documents is a driving force for improving the way we handle information on the net, and should be furthered in markup standards. Additions like inlining whole or parts of other documents by reference should be added to our markup language. At the same time, the technology needs to support accreditation and revenue of authors.
Litigation is not the solution to author-revenue protection. Indeed, litigation will do nothing but slow the pace of any technological developments. Currently, the cry of copyright infringement on the web prevents individual developers from pursuing some interesting work. This tendency to threaten others with litigation is both irresponsible and, in some jurisdictions, illegal. Unfortunately, lawsuits will be filed and judges with limited knowledge or understanding of technology will make rulings that impact the future. Technologists must take action now to prevent improper precedent. Do not depend on the legislators to create new law: there is no great movement under way to radically rewrite current copyright laws.
Creating alternative revenue models is important to avoid the application of potentially harmful revenue models due to a lack of alternatives … The web needs an improved revenue model which covers both the payment of the author and credits. The web technology designers should be aware that they have a fundamental affect on the revenue model that will be applied. Thus it may be important to integrate the creation of revenue models for the web as a part of the technological design. This may argue for the inclusion of specialists from other areas, such as economics and legislation, in the technology design process.
The web desperately needs some alternative protection for authors. The revenue model can be built into the web technology, bypassing the need for legislative protection. The role of legislation should be to cover eventual holes that the technology leaves behind when it comes to protecting intellectual property, and to maximize the large-scale creation of ideas and progress.
Web content providers can only look to current legislation for protection of their content to a limited degree. Rather they need to use the medium itself if they want to limit the usage of the content. Web technology designers can provide a framework for making this possible. The web itself can be used to create most of the necessary intellectual protection. For example, in the case of re-publications on the web, web robots combined with pattern matching can automate the searching for identical or substantially similar work. The ability to overcome the limitations of legislation is now in the hands of web technology designers.
Enhancements of the method through which documents may be distributed on the WWW can limit the need for developers to copy chunks of documents authored by other individuals. Information creators must be provided with the necessary tools for exact linking and inlining of other documents. Rather than further inlining at the server, advanced inlining should be implemented on the client/browser. Documents which include information about its origin as part of the technical solution may further clarify who is entitled to claim recompense for any portion used in the production of another work.
Information is one of the few things humans can create without diminishing resources available to others. However, there are still economic obstacles related to information. The economists Cooter and Ulen describe the dilemma of private information property rights: without a legal monopoly not enough information will be produced, but with the legal monopoly too little information will be used. If we want to move toward a web of information with a quality worth paying for, an appropriate revenue model for information trade on the web must be facilitated.
Plain use of the web may cause copyright infringement in today’s legislative context. In the moment that an individual fetches a document and views it on their screen for more than a few seconds, a copy has been created. This is concrete evidence of how inappropriate the current interpretation of the law is, and the paradox that is created when applying the law to the creative use of modern technology. The creation of copies is an inherent feature of the technical design of the web, and necessary for the system to function appropriately. Thus, attempts to change the web technology to adapt to current copyright regulations will have negative side-effects on the technical design. However, one should not instantly assume that ordinary use of the web will subject the reader to suit. Current U.S. copyright analysis requires a review of the facts and law to determine if there is fair use.
The technology of the web creates interesting discrepancies when it comes to the issue of fixation. It appears that some transmissions will not be sufficiently fixed to merit intellectual property protection … Any attempt to retrofit existing law to apply to current technology is a dead end and will not fulfill the purpose of copyright. Additional law will only succeed in slowing future development.
Society uses intellectual property protection to maximize progress. The paradox of maximal progress in information-based products is important. Lack of copyright regulation and ownership protection of information would create a situation where no one would want to produce a medium or its content, because they would either not receive revenue or would receive inadequate revenue. On the other hand, too much regulation would chill development, because it would lead to the monopoly of specific products, and the inability to build on previous ideas … Authorship information does not need to get lost, despite inlining or even repeated cutting and pasting. If web technology standards includes digital signatures in documents, the result can be higher creativity because each author gets credit (or revenue) for his work. Such decisions by web technologists may potentially affect the need for intellectual property protection laws.