“You Can’t Solve Business Problems with the Legal System”

I heard an interesting session from the O’Reilly Tools of Change conference via my IT Conversations podcast feed. One of Google’s senior copyright lawyers William Patry spoke about how you can’t use copyright law to solve your business problems – not by altering the enforcement of it or lobbying for stricter laws or any of it. Key quotes (paraphrased from memory as it was a 6 AM dog walk when I heard it):

“When you use the legal system to try to solve your business problems, and the ultimate effect is losing respect for the legal system”

“You can’t sue your customers into caring about and buying your product.”

I think this is a very interesting listen. It’s under 25 minutes total and if your income is in any way is tied to copyright, you should invest a half hour listening to this.