DMS 417/516: Take-Home Exam

DUE: 5 May
via e-mail (depape@buffalo.edu) or to my office (CFA 250)

• Write your answers on a separate sheet (or sheets) of paper, or send them to me by e-mail (no Microsoft Word files; plain text or PDF are acceptable).
• All questions are based on Lawrence Lessig's book Free Culture.
• You may use the book, and any other references, freely. You may not get help from other people.
• Cite details from the book to support your answers, where appropriate.
• Each question is worth the same amount.

The Questions:

1. What technologies does Lessig discuss that have affected the state of copyright law?
   (e.g. "steel, the automobile, the telegraph")
   
   
2. Why, in Lessig's view, should ordinary people (i.e. society as a whole) be concerned about changes in copyright law?
   
   
3. Based on the stories of Jesse Jordan and Jon Else, why is it ofen not enough just to be legally in the right?
   
   
4. In chapter 5, Lessig divides file sharing activities into 4 categories. Why? In other words, how is this approach meant affect the debate over file sharing?
   
   
5. How does the DMCA effectively extend the power of copyright to allow companies to control public domain works?
   
   
6. How was Eric Eldred's work similar to that of Walt Disney's?
   
   
7. Why is the Copyright Term Extension Act wrong, according to Lessig?
   
   
8. How do Free Software and the Creative Commons depend on copyright law?