Most Popular Books by John Rothchild

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The anticircumvention rules, enacted as part of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act in 1998, promote the use of technological protection measures (TPMs) by publishers of copyrighted materials in digital formats. Many types of works incorporate some type of TPM. For example, the Content Scramble System, which is implemented on commercially released movie DVDs, makes it impossible to copy such a movie without the use of some technology that circumvents the TPM. Tethering technologies prevent Windows XP from being installed on more than one computer, and prevent playing an .mp3 music file downloaded from iTunes on more than five computers. In this Article I argue that publishers'' use of TPMs gives rise to negative externalities, imposing costs on those who are not parties to the transaction in which the TPM-protected good is sold. Therefore, as is generally the case with technologies that yield negative externalities, in the absence of any regulatory limits on the use of TPMs profit-maximizing publishers will implement TPMs at an inefficiently high level. Regulatory action aimed at making publishers take into account some of the externalized harms caused by TPMs is justified on the basis of two analogies. First, public policy as embodied in the legal regimes of intellectual property protection allows authors, inventors, and producers generally to internalize some of the positive externalities resulting from their efforts; requiring publishers to internalize some of the negative externalities of TPMs seems equally justified. Second, public policy requires other classes of entities generating negative externalities - in particular, polluters - to internalize some of the resulting costs; consistency calls for placing the same requirement on publishers. I consider four possible regulatory responses to the problem I have identified. These are traditional command-and-control regulation, Coasean bargaining, Pigouvian taxes, and cap-and-trade allowances. I find that traditional command-and-control regulation is not the best choice because it fails to take advantage of information held by market participants, and Coasean bargaining is impractical due to the large number of interested parties and consequent high bargaining costs. Pigouvian taxes and cap-and-trade both do a better job of incorporating marketplace intelligence, and there is no clear basis for preferring one over the other. In the absence of any more definitive criterion, I propose a cap-and-trade program as the more market-oriented of the two.

The idea of network neutrality has dominated telecommunication policy discussions over the past few years to an extent unprecedented in the history of that subject matter. In March 2015, the Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”) issued a detailed scheme of regulation that makes network neutrality the law of the land, via a regulatory framework called the Open Internet Order. The path by which the FCC arrived at the Order was anything but direct, and the fate of the Order is yet to be decided by the courts. This chapter offers a guide through the thorny paths of network neutrality. The chapter begins with a review of the historical precursors to network neutrality regulation, starting with a 1956 court decision that disapproved an effort by AT&T to ban the attachment of non-harmful devices to the phone system, and continuing through FCC rulemakings in the 1960s and 1970s that governed the participation of telephone companies in the provision of services that involved processing of data. These competition-enhancing rules led to a 2005 FCC policy statement that set forth a set of principles that the FCC would apply to ensure that Internet service providers would not be able to distort competition by discriminating against particular content, applications, or non-harmful devices. The principles underlying the policy statement were then implemented in a 2010 rule. In a 2014 decision, the D.C. Circuit invalidated the Order as inconsistent with the FCC''s statutory authority. The FCC thereupon initiated a new rulemaking, which resulted in its issuance of a new Open Internet Order in 2015. As of the writing of this chapter, a challenge to the 2015 Order is pending before the D.C. Circuit.The chapter continues by analyzing the content of the 2015 Order, placing it in the context of its historical antecedents. It concludes by addressing several objections that opponents of network neutrality regulation have raised to network neutrality regulation.

Some topics covered are: how to rate your house and yourself as energy users; testing your house for leakiness; managing the temperature setting, air flows, water use, and windows. Cures for a leaky house are discussed by location: attic, interior walls, exterior walls, heating and cooling ducts, basement and water heater. Methods of assessing the investment options and evaluating the big purchases are discussed.