Despite what you may have been told, you may not use LZ’s words as you see fit, as if you owned them, while you hide behind the rubric of “fair use”. “Fair use” is a very-broadly defined doctrine, of which I take a very narrow interpretation, and I expect my views to be respected. We can therefore either more or less amicably work [...]]]> Ann Bartow’s post about Paul Zukofsky, son of Louis and Celia Zukofsky, and his attempt to exert extreme control over his parents’ work reveals that heirs are problem for copyright. Mr. Zukofsky asserts some untenable points about his power over the material and the need for academics to seek his approval. The full letter is on his site. Here are some choice quotes:

Despite what you may have been told, you may not use LZ’s words as you see fit, as if you owned them, while you hide behind the rubric of “fair use”. “Fair use” is a very-broadly defined doctrine, of which I take a very narrow interpretation, and I expect my views to be respected. We can therefore either more or less amicably work out the fees that I demand; you can remove all quotation; or we can turn the matter over to lawyers, this last solution being the worst of the three, but one which I will use if I need to enforce my rights. …

Next, other than for the following, I am not trying to censor you. I hardly give a damn what is said about my father (I am far more protective of my mother) as long as the name is spelled properly, and the fees are paid. My interest is almost purely economic. That being said, I do not approve of delving into the personal lives of my parents. If you wish to spend your time worrying if LZ did or did not shtupp alligators, that is your problem, but I will not approve quotation. That is not scholarship. That is gossip, and beneath contempt. …

Finally, when all else fails, and you remain hell-bent on quoting LZ, but you really, really REALLY do not want to deal with me, or you have been stupidly advised to try to circumvent me — remind yourself again and again, and yet once more, what Lyndon Baines Johnson’s said about J. Edgar Hoover i.e.: “I’d rather have him inside the tent pissing out, than outside pissing in”.

Although these statements may seem like ravings, Mr. Zukofsky is not alone in having these perspectives. As some know, the Joyce, T.S. Elliot, J.R.R. Tolkien, J.M. Barrie, Sylvia Plath, Samuel Beckett, and Bertolt Brecht estates have expressed similar views. What strikes me here is that although Louis and Celia Zukofsky are important figures in American poetry, I would bet that many are unaware of who they are. Their son’s perspective of wanting extreme control, little discussion, and rent extraction indicates his interest in, well, his interests. Those do not seem to include aiding people who wish to keep the artists in question alive as part of our culture. All of which makes me think Mr. Zukofsky might take a lesson from another poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley, for I think that not even the pedestal may remain for his parents if he maintains this posture.

OZYMANDIAS

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter’d visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp’d on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

IMAGE: WikiCommons. Thought to have inspired the poem.
License: GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation

Description: The British Museum, Room 4 – Colossal bust of Ramesses II, the ‘Younger Memnon’ From the Ramesseum, Thebes, Egypt 19th Dynasty, about 1250 BC. One of the largest pieces of Egyptian sculpture in the British Museum. Weighing 7.25 tons, this fragment of his statue was cut from a single block of two-coloured granite. He is shown wearing the nemes head-dress surmounted by a cobra diadem.

Author: Mujtaba Chohan E-mail: m.chohan@gmail.com Source: British Museum Visit

1976

Pastime Paradise – Stevie Wonder

1995

Gangstas Paradise – Coolio

1996 By the way, I suggest that anyone wanting a great album acquire Stevie Wonder’s Songs in the Key of Life.

1.  The Justices seemed to reject the argument that Section 101 should be read broadly since the novelty and nonobviousness requirements were sufficient to prevent things like “a method of speed dating” from being patented.  Counsel for Bilski kept responding to the Court’s hypotheticals by saying that the proposed processes could “potentially” be patentable if they met the other statutory requirements.  Nobody embraced that view.  I think this is a good sign, because in practice 102 and 103 haven’t worked well as gatekeepers.

2.  Unfortunately, the suggestions by the Justices about how to limit Section 101 were [...]]]> Here are some observations about the oral argument today in Bilski, which dealt with the scope of patentable subject matter and (potentially) the viability of business method and software patents.

1.  The Justices seemed to reject the argument that Section 101 should be read broadly since the novelty and nonobviousness requirements were sufficient to prevent things like “a method of speed dating” from being patented.  Counsel for Bilski kept responding to the Court’s hypotheticals by saying that the proposed processes could “potentially” be patentable if they met the other statutory requirements.  Nobody embraced that view.  I think this is a good sign, because in practice 102 and 103 haven’t worked well as gatekeepers.

2.  Unfortunately, the suggestions by the Justices about how to limit Section 101 were not well thought out. Declaring that 101 “excludes business methods” or includes only “technology” will just create a decade of uncertainty as people try to figure out what those categories mean.  What we need from the Court is a set of factors that can guide the analysis — my own views on that are here.

3.  The viability of State Street Bank is in doubt.  At least two Justices (Kennedy and Stevens) seemed unclear about whether State Street should survive, even though the Government took the position that the case was correctly decided.  I don’t think that the Court will take down software patents in this case, but I think the odds went from about 5% to about 20%.

I’d rather my fans not read this version of Midnight Sun. It was only an incomplete draft; the writing is messy and flawed and full of mistakes. But how [...]]]> Apparently Stephenie Meyer, the author of the Twilight series, started writing a version of the series from a different character’s (Edward’s) point of view and the early, incomplete draft was leaked onto the Internet. Jacqui Lipton’s post about Stephenie Meyer’s “reaction to the unauthorized release” of her partial draft reveals another way to think about what is going on here. I followed the link to Ms. Meyer’s post about the problem. I was quite surprised to see that Ms. Meyer has posted the draft on her web site while also expressing her view about reading the draft:

I’d rather my fans not read this version of Midnight Sun. It was only an incomplete draft; the writing is messy and flawed and full of mistakes. But how do I comment on this violation without driving more people to look for the illegal posting? It has taken me a while to decide how and if I could respond. But to end the confusion, I’ve decided to make the draft available here (at the end of this post). This way, my readers don’t have to feel they have to make a sacrifice to stay honest. I hope this fragment gives you further insight into Edward’s head and adds a new dimension to the Twilight story. That’s what inspired me to write it in the first place.

Why post the draft? One could simply ask readers not to read the draft floating around the Internet. Note that Ms. Meyer explicitly does not want to drive people to the unauthorized work. To me this move seems like a way to re-capture the attention that might have gone the sites with the download. In that sense, she may be using her reputation and attention power to undercut the benefits that may flow from unauthorized distribution. Of course there may be sales problems here as some may have been willing to pay even for the rough draft. But that idea probably does not cut off the usual claim that leaking will harm the final market. I would be surprised if those who read the early manuscript will not be more than happy to buy the final draft. In other words, the law often claims that the harm in such leaking or copying is that the unauthorized version is a substitute for the full work which I don’t think is the case.

To be clear, I think Ms. Meyer doesn’t want people to read the draft. But faced with the draft being out there, her response is simply a wise strategy. She tells her fans 1) Don’t read it 2) If you have to read it, read it from my site, 3) Reading from my site is a way to stay “honest” and not “sacrifice” (I am not sure what is being sacrificed but I think it is integrity or loyalty to the author) which means not fueling those who are taking value away from her.

There is an extra point here. When Ms. Meyer says she can’t continue with the book, she is giving honest information to her fans: certain acts (i.e., unauthorized copying and distribution of her work) upset her. In fact, they upset her enough that she will not finish the work in question. I don’t think this point is a threat. And, regardless of motivation, the move tells fans how she wants to interact with them. Insofar as there is relationship with her fans, Ms. Meyer has communicated what she expects. A Rebecca Tushnet pointed out in the comments to Jacqui’s post, there are already “over 100,000 Twilight stories–some of them from Edward’s perspective–available at fanfiction.net. How Ms. Meyer feels about those stories may differ from how she feels about her draft being distributed without permission. So as Jacqui points out this one is personal, but I think it may also be professionally wise.

P.S. Those interested in more on how reputation and attention will be a key asset in an online world may want to read my essay Individual Branding: How the Rise of Individual Creation and Distribution of Cultural Products Confuses the Intellectual Property System.

I highly recommend the keynote lunch with Pam Samuelson and Paul Courant. That panel warmed [...]]]> D is for Digital is over now. I urge anyone interested in the Google Book Deal (aka the Google Book Search) to check out the schedule page and the webcast links (the stream links are at the top of the Friday and Saturday schedules respectively). James Grimmelmann put together a conference that aired out pro and con views rather well. In fact, I’d say although many were questioning the deal, I learned a good amount about the views of those in favor of the deal. I was not convinced that the deal is good and should go forward, but I appreciated hearing more about how the deal evolved and defenders’ views.

I highly recommend the keynote lunch with Pam Samuelson and Paul Courant. That panel warmed up the group. Some really good questions about transparency of the process, responsibility, and more came up. Pam’s key point that if one builds a pubic good this big, public trust responsibilities go with it was dead on for me. I highly recommend watching the video for all that was said.

The next panel C is for Culture was excellent. James asked a question that has been on my mind and we had kicked around at WIP IP last week. Is Google Book Search irrelevant?

Here is why that is good question. First, the day so far emphasized that the majority of the books in question are academic books. As Pam explained and Paul Duguid echoed, if scholars’ books are at stake, scholars should be involved. Paul made clear that scholarly standards should guide the project.

Now, consider that many books are becoming available on BitTorrent. In addition, one panelist, Dan Reetz has a fascinating project. His DIYscanner project is a wild moment in grassroots digital activism. The story of how he chose to build his low-cost, open source DIY scanner (we’re talking maybe $300-$400 total) so that one could scan personal (and other books) at the rate of a few seconds per page and without destroying the book merits another post. (for now here is a link to the plans to build your own scanner) In addition, Reetz noted that majority of new books are leaked prepublication. As a general matter, a key claim is that users will pay for a book but copy the book so that they can search and take many books with them. The importance of these changes is that crowd-sourced and other approaches to digitizing text is on the move. One can see this shift as indicating market failure or that ereader functionality will be more and more the case.

As scanners, ereaders, and companies like Stanza offer better ways to access, search, mark, and read, the walled or controlled version of the text experience that the Google Book Deal offers seems odd. I doubt, however, that it will be irrelevant. Google’s brand, the ease of searching (even with its errors so far), and the ability to trust Google over BitTorrent or other sources will likely make it relevant to many. Nonetheless, the growth in alternative sources would suggest that Google will need to choose between a web search that captures all useful book offerings or a Google Book Search that only gives Google Book results. As the last panel on antitrust explored, Google is already dominant in search. It arguably killed a little company called MapQuest. Once Google offered its maps and its maps became the default listing when one entered address information into the search, MapQuest was done. That seems awfully close to the MS bundling issues of the last decade. When it comes to books, Google’s lead and dominance will give it massive power and leverage over how we all access knowledge. Nonetheless, it may be that grassroots, crowd-sourced movements will permit an end around for the control the publishers want through this deal. To be clear an end-around is insufficient protection against the lock-in problems the Google Book Deal poses, but it may help push Google to reach a deal that is less run by publisher interests.

First neither party represents the public. One cannot expect them to represent the public, and one ought not trust they will do the right thing for the public. To be clear, I am not making a moral judgment here. I expect, as we all should, that each party will seek to maximize its position. Understanding why I refuse to call this situation a settlement helps understand this point. As many know, this action encompasses far more than [...]]]> The Google Book Deal is suspended. Time to cheer, correct? No. As Pam Samuelson noted in the New York Times, that probably is too little time to resolve the issues at hand. In fact I think right now is when the GBD is at quite a dangerous stage.

First neither party represents the public. One cannot expect them to represent the public, and one ought not trust they will do the right thing for the public. To be clear, I am not making a moral judgment here. I expect, as we all should, that each party will seek to maximize its position. Understanding why I refuse to call this situation a settlement helps understand this point. As many know, this action encompasses far more than the claims at issue in the suit. Many think that Google was on strong grounds for its fair use clam and its original use. The Publishers (aka the Registry seeming to be working for authors) saw the chance to get ahead of the digital curve. Unlike music and film, they realized they could look good and capture publishing’s future. They offered Google a deal that Google did not need. Or did it? Although Google is a data vacuum and does well with the ad-based business model, the search giant has been searching for a new revenue stream. Online ads can’t be the only source of revenue from any viewpoint. That is a precarious position. Indeed, the online ad market just took a big dip. The Deal presents Google with the chance to make money from something other than ads.

With this perspective one sees that expecting or trusting either party to look out for the public’s interest is foolish. My guess is that the public choice literature could yield some useful ways to think about the problem too, but I have not thought that through as yet.

Second, Google and the Publishers now have a wave of information from all quarters that they can use to their benefit. Here is the strategy that I expect to see. Assess the most severe and some of the less severe criticisms. Incorporate some of them in changes. Keep the deal as is for the most part (Note that is precisely what the Registry said will be the case “the core agreement is going to stay the same.”). Then when the time to approve, deny, or move the Deal to another form comes, one claims “We acted in good faith. We can’t keep everyone happy. Without this deal no one wins. Can’t we get along, move forward, and sort the details later? That is a more reasonable way to proceed.”

More importantly, those who have kept paying attention to the problem may start to lose focus or fade out. People may become tired or say is this thing still going on?

And that is why I say Danger Will Robinson. The Google Book Deal is at Defcon 2.

Excellent multitasking, folks. In future DMCA smackdowns, Cory will cure cancer, save the rainforest, and abolish the designated hitter rule.

(Image: Wikicommons)

I wonder why “Coke,” which is a registered trademark of Coca-Cola, has never been challenged on this basis. Many people use “Coke” to mean “cola,” even though there are other kinds of cola (e.g. Pepsi and R.C.). Indeed, in some parts of the country “Coke” is commonly used to mean “soda.”  And how often do you find yourself at a restaurant asking for a “Coke,” being [...]]]> Here’s an issue that bugs me every time I teach genericism in trademark law.  As you may know, if a brand name becomes the word of choice to describe the actual product (e.g., aspirin or thermos) then the trademark rights lapse because allowing one firm to hold a monopoly over such a word would put competitors at a huge disadvantage.

I wonder why “Coke,” which is a registered trademark of Coca-Cola, has never been challenged on this basis. Many people use “Coke” to mean “cola,” even though there are other kinds of cola (e.g. Pepsi and R.C.). Indeed, in some parts of the country “Coke” is commonly used to mean “soda.”  And how often do you find yourself at a restaurant asking for a “Coke,” being asked “Is Pepsi OK?” and answering “Fine, I don’t care.”  This would suggest that people think of “Coke” and “cola” as interchangeable

Now obviously there are people who do express a strong preference for Coke and swear up and down that it’s better than other kinds of cola.  The question is how many people are in this camp and is that enough to justify giving “Coke” trademark protection.  Anyone know of any empirical data on this?

Here’s the missing part.  INS was Hearst’s wire service, and Hearst was strongly anti-British [...]]]> While reading a biography of Hearst, I came across something I did not know about International News Service v. Associated Press, the 1918 Supreme Court decision that established the misappropriation doctrine.  The case was brought by AP, which claimed that INS (a rival wire service) was reprinting its news reports about the fighting during World War I verbatim and without attribution.  The Court held that this behavior was unlawful because the AP had “quasi-property” rights in their dispatches.  When I teach this case, the usual takeaway is that INS was “free-riding” on the AP because it was cheaper to borrow than to have their own correspondents in Europe to cover the war.

Here’s the missing part.  INS was Hearst’s wire service, and Hearst was strongly anti-British and opposed America’s entry into the War.  Eventually, the British Government kicked his reporters out of the country because they were deemed hostile propagandists.  Thus, Hearst could not cover the war without borrowing from the AP.  A little more imagination could lead to the conclusion that the Court’s holding in INS was a form of punishment for Hearst’s political views — a kind of wartime censorship — but I do not yet have any direct evidence for that interpretation.

Fun stuff but here is the problem. The Monty Python Channel has nowhere near the quantity of Python material one can find elsewhere on YouTube. I wonder whether the Python folks chose to leave the other posters alone and [...]]]> So I had my iTunes open and on shuffle yesterday when Monty Python’s “Finland” came on. That was what prompted me to check YouTube for Python offerings. Now the Python chaps have offered their own channel. This video has the usual Python cheek as they talk about YouTube, being ripped off, and the open plea that viewers buy the products after they enjoy them. The clip also touts the troop’s interest in showing the clips as they wanted them to be shown and in high quality.

Fun stuff but here is the problem. The Monty Python Channel has nowhere near the quantity of Python material one can find elsewhere on YouTube. I wonder whether the Python folks chose to leave the other posters alone and offer what they see as the best or most in demand clips in a branded area. Then again, they may have decided to go after the other posters too. And to think this train of thought all started in Finland. Finland? Yes, because I could take a CD, put into MP3 format, and listen to “Finland” as a shuffle tune. But wait. There’s more! The devil you say. No, really.

Check out the clip for Finland below. It is a good quality stream of the music. It is funny and adds a fair amount of creativity. It attributes the visual work and the software to make the work. It also acknowledges Python as the source of the music. In addition, it has embedded ads to allow a viewer to buy the song from iTunes or Amazon. Now given all the new works, Python’s failure to offer a similar video (even if they did the video is a new work albeit one needing the song to make much sense), AND the ads is it fair use? After all YouTube and the poster probably take a cut, as would the seller, but as the Python folks acknowledge they too are giving access to and enjoyment of their clips away for free with the plea that people buy their work. As my essay Individual Branding: How the Rise of Individual Creation and Distribution of Cultural Products Confuses the Intellectual Property System argues these facts present confusing situations for intellectual property. Sharing, attribution, some control, encouraging purchases, remixing, and more can all be seen in my encounter with Finland which may be my new personal metaphor for IP. Watch the video and tell me what you think, fair use, attribution, new work, infringement, all of the above?

Tiny bubbles In the wine Make me feel happy Ah, they make me feel fine

Those tiny bubbles Make me warm all over With a feeling that I’m gonna Love you till the end of time

The little charming talk bubbles all over the Internet communications have a similar warm effect. They remind me of comic strips and comic books and of adults droning “wa wawa waaa” in Peanuts cartoons on T.V. Ah no more. According to TechCrunch, when a developer wondered why his App had not been approved he was told “the bubbles in its chat rooms are too shiny, and Apple has trademarked that bubbly design.” Wow. Do comic strip and book folks know that Apple is that clever? The wondrous shiny dialogue bubble [...]]]> As Don Ho (and others) have sung:

Tiny bubbles
In the wine
Make me feel happy
Ah, they make me feel fine

Those tiny bubbles
Make me warm all over
With a feeling that I’m gonna
Love you till the end of time

The little charming talk bubbles all over the Internet communications have a similar warm effect. They remind me of comic strips and comic books and of adults droning “wa wawa waaa” in Peanuts cartoons on T.V. Ah no more. According to TechCrunch, when a developer wondered why his App had not been approved he was told “the bubbles in its chat rooms are too shiny, and Apple has trademarked that bubbly design.” Wow. Do comic strip and book folks know that Apple is that clever? The wondrous shiny dialogue bubble means Apple! Do the green bubbles qualify too? Yet again I am left wondering what’s a cubit and contemplating a drink with tiny, shiny bubbles.

So I leave you with Don Ho and Tiny Bubbles.

Tiny Bubbles – Don HO

Volume 56, Issue 6 (August 2009)

Articles

Overcoming Overdisclosure: Toward Tax Shelter Detection (pdf) Joshua D. Blank

First Amendment Enforcement in Government Institutions and Programs (pdf) Gia B. Lee

Ezra Pound’s Copyright Statute: Perpetual Rights and the Problem of Heirs (pdf) Robert Spoo

Comments

Nonwaiver Agreements After Federal Rule of Evidence 502: A Glance at Quick-Peek and Clawback Agreements (pdf) Jessica Wang

Narrowing the Definition of “Dwelling” Under the Fair Housing Act (pdf) Karen Wong

Addressing Youth Bias Crime (pdf) Jordan Blair Woods

Notice how the results indicate that there are “365 related articles”? Usually I click that and indeed see a rack of articles. Today, however, this is what happened when I clicked on the link promising a cornucopia of news stories:

Just one result! And it is only to AP page hosted by Google! (not sure whether Google is hosting all or [...]]]> So some of you may have heard that Glenn Beck has managed to upset advertisers by calling President Obama a racist. I don’t have much to say about Beck. I was more interested in the advertiser reaction. I saw the article on Yahoo! but wanted a more stable URL. So I copied the AP news story title and pasted into the Google. Here are the results.

Notice how the results indicate that there are “365 related articles”? Usually I click that and indeed see a rack of articles. Today, however, this is what happened when I clicked on the link promising a cornucopia of news stories:

Just one result! And it is only to AP page hosted by Google! (not sure whether Google is hosting all or most AP content, but it looks fishy). Maybe everyone was just running the AP story, but maybe those other outlets would have had more information of interest. Could it be that AP and Google are somehow in bed with each other on these results. (For all I know that is the case, and I missed that memo as I have been getting an article out the door and cleaning up a book chapter). Is this all part of AP’s claims regarding the ability to control its copy?

In short, watch the Google. It is creepy at times.

UPDATE: A quick commenter noted that the right side has a link that shows all the results “Sort by date with duplicates included.” THANKS!

I did not see that. Still I seem to recall that the related articles page used to have many of the redundant results. So the new approach could be helpful and efficient, but I wonder whether this new streamlined version of results applies to all news or just AP.

Furthermore, I throw open the idea that people may prefer the redundancies at the outset. That way they can go (as I did when I was on the web results page) to a source such as ABC or some other source one may trust or that one hoped would provide more than the AP coverage (be it vitriol over the boycott or praise for it).

Attorneys live and die by documents. As I tell my students, you must write well, because lawyers are paid in large part to write. With around 1.1 million attorneys practicing in the U.S., a large amount of paper, a.k.a., courts documents, is generated [...]]]> As some of you know I am a Visiting Fellow this year at Princeton’s Center for Information Technology Policy. When I arrived a couple weeks ago, I heard about a project in the works and have been dying to tell people about it. It is now live and looks great. It is called RECAP and just may change the way people access a major part of the law. We’re talking about the law that lurks outside cases; the actual guts of litigation.

Attorneys live and die by documents. As I tell my students, you must write well, because lawyers are paid in large part to write. With around 1.1 million attorneys practicing in the U.S., a large amount of paper, a.k.a., courts documents, is generated each and every day. Court documents are essentially public documents (there are times when papers are sealed etc., but that is a separate matter). The government runs a system called PACER that allows one to search for and access U.S. Appellate, District, and Bankruptcy court records and documents. But as the Washington Post explains, “The fee to access PACER is $0.08 per page: ‘The per page charge applies to the number of pages that results from any search, including a search that yields no matches (one page for no matches.) The charge applies whether or not pages are printed, viewed, or downloaded.’ For people who do a lot of legal research, those fees add up quickly.”

In an era of transparent government, open source, and access-to-knowledge movements, it was only a matter of time before someone decided to find a way to make court documents available on a broader basis. The folks at Stanford have the IP Litigation Clearing House. That project aims to fill the “critical need for a comprehensive, online resource for scholars, policy makers, industry, lawyers, and litigation support firms in the field of intellectual property litigation.” That project has 23,000 documents and is growing. Pretty darn good, if you ask me. But wait; don’t order yet! Now comes RECAP from the folks at Princeton’s Center for Information Technology Policy. (Specifically, Harlan Yu, Steve Schultze, and Timothy B. Lee developed the project which is led by Prof. Ed Felten). Here is the link to the About Page, but let me tell you a little more.

CITP’s Harlan Yu explains:

RECAP is a plug-in for the Firefox web browser that makes it easier for users to share documents they have purchased from PACER, the court’s pay-to-play access system. With the plug-in installed, users still have to pay each time they use PACER, but whenever they do retrieve a PACER document, RECAP automatically and effortlessly donates a copy of that document to a public repository hosted at the Internet Archive.

In addition, if one is using PACER and RECAP “The documents in this repository are, in turn, shared with other RECAP users, who will be notified whenever documents they are looking for can be downloaded from the free public repository.” So when one searches for a document, one is notified about the availability of a free copy of the document.

There is probably much more to say here, but for now I want to congratulate the folks here at CITP on a great idea that uses information, technology, law, and policy to craft an elegant solution to increasing government transparency. This resource should feed almost anyone interested in practicing or studying the law. Empirical researchers alone should be drooling at this new wealth of information.