Why Is Lawrence Lessig MIA In The Great SOPA Piracy Debate?

[Commentary] The debate over the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) has not yet included Lawrence Lessig, the genius law professor who created models to understand Internet culture and economics at a time when Google was still brand new and iTunes and YouTube didn’t yet exist.

Lessig is nowhere to be found. The copyright scholar has instead been promoting his idea of using state-level conventions to pass a constitutional amendment that would reform campaign finance. The move is consistent with Lessig’s announcement several years ago that he was stepping back from copyright issues in order to research institutional corruption. The goal is a laudable one, but, frankly, it’s playing out at best as quixotic and at worst as a Nader-like vanity project.

(11/20)