While it is always possible to ignore the importance of stories and go on with your life regardless, it may still be interesting to see what the interactive nature of the web does to journalism.

Nobody who reads a newspaper expects a way to read cout transcripts from their chair at the push of a botton. Nobody expects to be able to tell the author what they think with minimal trouble -- except on the web.

I hope the success of Grocklaw is part of the new model for American journalism. Little by little the expectation of sources and background data might do good things for truth in America. These practices certainly furnish the underdogs with a realistic way to go the extra mile to convice those interested.

Of course it still depends on whether we have enough interested readers.

ls

The issue over who defines what is the best format for Intellectual Property is a huge one for the world right now.

Intellectual Property owners have been very succussful in phrasing the argument such that anyone who opposes them is somehow suspect. This simply isn't so.

Authors rights are a good thing but those rights exist in a context of time and utility. Should I be able to use an idea of mine before you can -- certainly. Should I be able to stop anyone else in the whole world from using their idea, the same as mine, just because I thought of it (or registerred it first)?

I wonder how many English and European patents were ignored by continental\revolutionary America. Furthermore what was the affect of isolated markets on the patent process. Patent law still springs from a time when organizational\technological barriers made patents far more local in their authority.

Do I in the United states have the moral right to halt or garner the first steps of Ethiopia towards economic prosperity? More and more trade agreements are tied to the intellectual property laws DMCA, etc.. every day.

Citizens support laws in a broad context, striking down bad laws for many reasons. There are more than dollars at stake. If laws represent our collective will we are each made guilty if they are tyrannous.

LS