SOPA, PROTECT IP will stifle creativity and diminish free speech, say WUSTL experts
Wikipedia and other sites plan to go dark to protest the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the PROTECT IP Act under consideration in Congress. Three law professors from Washington University in St. Louis, Kevin Collins, Gregory Magarian and Neil Richards, signed a letter to Congress in opposition to the PROTECT IP Act. Read Magarian and Richards’ current comments on SOPA and PROTECT IP.
Andrew C. Mertha, Ph.D., assisstant professor of political science in Arts & Sciences
His new book is titled The Politics of Piracy: Intellectual Property in Contemporary China.
War on intellectual property theft in China best fought at local level, suggests new book
Spurred by concerns over China’s booming economy, the Bush administation plans to crank-up pressure on Chinese authorities to curtail the rampant theft of intellectual property — the black market in pirated films, software and equipment that costs American companies billions in lost sales. While anti-piracy rhetoric plays well in Washington, a new book on the “Politics of Piracy” in China suggests that external diplomatic pressure will have little effect on China’s ability to enforce international norms on copyrights, trademarks and patents. “The key to gaining enforcement of those laws lies at the local level,” says the book’s author, WUSTL China specialist Andrew Mertha.