Project info for Openlaw

Created 5 Aug 2000 at 15:16 UTC by bwtaylor, last modified 9 Aug 2000 at 20:05 UTC by bwtaylor.

Homepage: http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/

Notes:

Though not a "software project", Openlaw is an experiment in crafting legal argument in an open forum, headed up by Wendy Seltzer of Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet & Society. Openlaw develops arguments, draft pleadings, and edit briefs in public, online. Non-lawyers and lawyers alike are invited to join the process by adding thoughts to the mailing lists, "brainstorm" outlines, drafting and commenting on drafts in progress, and suggesting reference sources.

Building on the model of open source software, we are working from the hypothesis that an open development process best harnesses the distributed resources of the Internet community. By using the Internet, we hope to enable the public interest to speak as loudly as the interests of corporations. Openlaw is therefore a large project built through the coordinated effort of many small (and not so small) contributions.

Openlaw has a forum devoted to the DVD cases dealing with DeCSS, and also Eldred v. Reno, which is seeking to challege the Sony Bono Copyright Extention Act.

Accomplishments in the DeCSS cases include submitting an amicus brief, and a reply comment on the DMCA to the Copyright Office, as well as working closely with the EFF and defense team through our dvd-discuss mailing list.

The Eldred v. Reno case is working it's way through appeal, with legal briefs being filed.

License: Public Domain

This project has the following developers:

schoen is a Contributor.
samth is a Developer.
wseltzer is a Lead Developer.
bwtaylor is a Contributor.

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