Have you had your creativity and expression crushed by intellectual property law? Did you have a business, a work of art, a blog entry or some other form of endeavor that was squashed by the threat or reality of a trademark, copyright or patent suit?
Public Knowledge, Creative Commons, and The Center for the Study of the Public Domain are putting together a public-education campaign to disseminate IP law horror-stories to help people understand what the expansion of copyright and related doctrines has cost us all. They want your stories for the collection.
We'd like to hear stories from artists, authors, musicians, filmmakers, computer programmers, entrepreneurs, librarians – or anyone with a personal story involving intellectual property law. Your stories are important because American copyright, trademark and patent law, grounded in Article I of the Constitution, are designed to promote individual creativity and innovation: we need to make sure they're functioning in this way.
Unfortunately, the recent expansion of intellectual property laws has had the opposite effect. New laws are discouraging creativity and innovation rather than encouraging it, and stifling other important values such as freedom of speech. Longer copyright terms, the end of copyright registration requirements, stronger trademark laws and the expansion of patent eligibility are some of the changes that have spurred this trend.
