So central is the idea of the freedom of speech, that the Bill of Rights places it first and foremost as the primary tenet of a democratic republic. Specifically, “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press[.]” Further, this potent protection providing freedom of speech presumptively applies to all forms of artistic expression: words, images, sounds, movements and more. In an era where anyone with an Internet connection and a thought can be a writer/publisher, the importance of such a right has perhaps never felt more real to “We the people.”
In addition to this freedom, the U.S. Constitution provides a means of incentivising our creative authorship by protecting it for a limited time from misappropriation. Specifically, Article 1, Section 8, Clause 8 of the U.S. Constitution, affectionately known as the Copyright Clause, reads: “Congress shall have Power to…[secure] for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries…[.]” By granting authors the right to prevent infringers from profiting off of unauthorized copies of their works, Congress provided a means by which creators of copyrightable content could make a living through the ability to monopolize their content for a set period of time.
Therein lies the contradiction. Continue Reading…
