Copyrights expert witnesses will want to take note of what copyright scholars and advocates had to say at the Tech Policy Summit in Hollywood. The Summit “demonstrated that while copyright must function in a converged world, opinions on how it should function are as divergent as ever.” The panel consisted of Patrick Ross (Executive Director, Copyright Alliance), Fred von Lohmann (Senior Staff Attorney, EFF), Matt Zinn (VP and general counsel, TiVo), and moderator Doug Lichtman of UCLA Law School. ZDnet also writes:
The primary bone of contention was the extent to which copyright law does and should leave room for permissionless innovation. Matt Zinn and Fred von Lohmann discussed the benefits of such a system. Zinn said, “Fortunately, the Constitution got it right. Copyrights are not absolute rights. TiVo did not have to go to the rightsholders for permission [to build a product that allows flexible use of lawfully acquired copyrighted content]. If they’d had to, there’d be no DVR. With no DVR, there’d be no VOD.”