Law and Economics in Cyberspace: Napster and Beyond
University of Siena Working Paper
Posted: 24 Jul 2001
Date Written: May 2001
Abstract
The article will outline the economics of copyright and exclusive distribution of contents in Internet, assessing economic cost and benefits deriving from the application of standard economic and legal principles to Internet distribution. After having outlined the terms of the debate on the economics of Napster and other similar sites, the article suggests new policy options enhancing social efficiency in the Internet: (i) revising legal safeguards for intellectual property (the Internet requires to revise scope and breadth of copyrights) and (ii) proposing a direct contact between authors and on-line consumers (for Internet transmission of contents it is not necessary to have a high cost intermediate distributors as the main majors in cd and video production and distribution).
JEL Classification: D40, K21
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation