American academic & political activist (1961- )
I think what's striking is that the overwhelming majority of Americans see a problem with the way money influences politics and want it fixed. Our polls show that more than 90 percent of Americans believe it's important to reduce the influence of money in politics. And that's true for Republicans as much as Democrats and Independents. This is just a universal view. Yet we don't do anything about it, because most of us think the system is so entrenched. There was a poll a couple of years ago by the Clarus Group which found that 80 percent of Americans believe that every reform has been for the purpose of entrenching the incumbents, as opposed to actually reforming the system. Most of us wish we could fly like Superman, but we don't leap off of tall buildings because we recognize we can't. And it's the same thing here. We just have this politics of resignation -- a belief that there's nothing you can do about it, that the rich and powerful will control our politics and that's the way it will always be.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
"Lawrence Lessig Has a Moonshot Plan to Halt Our Slide Toward Plutocracy", Moyers & Company, April 25, 2014
The more important point, however, is not about what the money does. It's about what has to be done to get the money. The effect of the money might be (democratically) benign. But what is done to secure that money is not necessarily benign. To miss this point is to betray the Robin Hood fallacy: the fact that the loot was distributed justly doesn't excuse the means taken to secure it.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress--and a Plan to Stop It
As more and more citizens express what they think, and defend it in writing, that will change the way people understand public issues. It is easy to be wrong and misguided in your head. It is harder when the product of your mind can be criticized by others. Of course, it is a rare human who admits that he has been persuaded that he is wrong. But it is even rarer for a human to ignore when he has been proven wrong. The writing of ideas, arguments, and criticism improves democracy.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
Free Culture: The Nature and Future of Creativity
There is a regulation of behavior on the Internet and in cyberspace, but that regulation is imposed primarily through code. The differences in the regulations effected through code distinguish different parts of the Internet and cyberspace. In some places, life is fairly free; in other places, it is more controlled. And the difference between these spaces is simply a difference in the architectures of control--that is, a difference in code.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
Code: Version 2.0
A time is marked not so much by ideas that are argued about as by ideas that are taken for granted. The character of an era hangs upon what needs no defense. Power runs with ideas that only the crazy would draw into doubt. The "taken for granted" is the test of sanity; "what everyone knows" is the line between us and them.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
The Future of Ideas
Creation always involves building upon something else. There is no art that doesn't reuse. And there will be less art if every reuse is taxed by the appropriator. Monopoly controls have been the exception in free societies; they have been the rule in closed societies.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
"May the Source Be With You", Wired Magazine, December 9, 2001
"Writing" is the Latin of our times. The modern language of the people is video and sound.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
Wikimania 2006
The outside spends most of its time ignoring the inside. Maybe once every four years it takes notice. Maybe in a catastrophe, or when some celebration rises above the ratings of 60 Minutes. But until then, the outside just wants to live its life. It wants to drive across a bridge without worrying about the engineering. It wants to believe that our kids are safe and that public education works. It wants to climb aboard an airplane without wondering whether the FAA is competent. It wants to know that there is a government that is at least trying to do what's best for this nation. The outside wants to trust. It wants to trust that there's an inside that's at least competent.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
One Way Forward: The Outsider's Guide to Fixing the Republic
There's going to be an i-9/11 event. Which doesn't necessarily mean an Al Qaeda attack, it means an event where the instability or the insecurity of the internet becomes manifest during a malicious event which then inspires the government into a response. You've got to remember that after 9/11 the government drew up the Patriot Act within 20 days and it was passed.... So I was having dinner with Richard Clarke and I asked him if there is an equivalent, is there an i-Patriot Act just sitting waiting for some substantial event as an excuse to radically change the way the internet works. He said "of course there is".
LAWRENCE LESSIG
Fortune Brainstorm panel, "2018: Life on the Net", 2008
Overregulation stifles creativity. It smothers innovation. It gives dinosaurs a veto over the future. It wastes the extraordinary opportunity for a democratic creativity that digital technology enables.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
Free Culture
Why should it be that just when technology is most encouraging of creativity, the law should be most restrictive?
LAWRENCE LESSIG
Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy
We live in a world with "free" content, and this freedom is not an imperfection. We listen to the radio without paying for the songs we hear; we hear friends humming tunes that they have not licensed. We tell jokes that reference movie plots without the permission of the directors. We read our children books, borrowed from a library, without paying the original copyright holder for the performance rights.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
"May the Source Be With You", Wired Magazine, December 9, 2001
We've got to eventually get the Court on the right track with respect to super PACs and their influence on our political system. And whether that means an amendment to the Constitution or not is an open question.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
"Lawrence Lessig Has a Moonshot Plan to Halt Our Slide Toward Plutocracy", Moyers & Company, April 25, 2014
It might be crazy to expect a high government official to speak the truth. It might be crazy to believe that government policy will be something more than the handmaiden of the most powerful interests. It might be crazy to argue that we should preserve a tradition that has been part of our tradition for most of our history -- free culture. If this is crazy, then let there be more crazies. Soon.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
Free Culture
Every generation welcomes the pirates from the last.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
Free Culture: The Nature and Future of Creativity
Lawyers rarely test their power, or the power they promote, against this simple pragmatic question: "Will it do good?" When challenged about the expanding reach of the law, the lawyer answers, "Why not?"
LAWRENCE LESSIG
Free Culture
Well, it certainly is not the case that you would ever get Disney to agree that copyright terms are limited. That's why we've gone to the courts. But if copyright terms are limited-if we succeed in establishing that-then we can begin to think about other steps after that. One idea that we've been floating is this: Everybody talks about intellectual property as a form of "property." One thing we might ask these people is, "Have you paid your property taxes for this property?" Of course, the answer is no. We have taxes on land, and taxes on cars, but not taxes on the form of "property" that copyright protects. So I think we might use this disparity to help fuel a regeneration of the public domain.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
"Righting Copyright: An Interview with Lawrence Lessig", Cabinet Magazine, fall 2002
The crystal ball has a question mark in its center. There are some fundamental choices to be made. We will either choose to continue to wage a hopeless war to preserve the existing architecture for copyright by upping the stakes and using better weapons to make sure that people respect it. If we do this, public support for copyright will continue to weaken, pushing creativity underground and producing a generation that is alienated from the copyright concept.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
interview, WIPO Magazine, February 2011