Innovation Law and Policy Workshop
presents
Professor Maurizio Borghi
Brunel University Law School
Copyright and Truth
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
12:30 – 2:00
Solarium (room FA2), Falconer Hall
84 Queen’s Park
This article calls into question the primary meaning of copyright law. It argues that copyright is not, primarily, a means to an end – however worthy and even utmost –, but rather a fundamental mode of human existence. The starting point of the analysis is the Kant’s definition of book as “public address” and of author’s rights as ultimately grounded in the most fundamental need that human beings share when living in community with others, namely, the need for truth. The article questions the concept of “truth” as originally tied with human existence as such, and as related with other fundamental categories thereof. Building on such analysis, it finally attempts to characterize the specificity of copyright in comparison with its “fellow rights” patents and trade marks.
Maurizio Borghi (Ph.D. Bocconi University; B.A. Bocconi University) teaches intellectual property and technology law. His scholarship focuses primarily on digital copyright, as well as on theoretical and historical aspects of intellectual property law.
Borghi is involved in the COUNTER (Counterfeiting and Piracy Research) European research project, and serves on the editorial boards of Ancilla Iuris and Primary Sources on Copyright. He is also on the Steering Committee of the International Society for the History and Theory of Intellectual Property (ISHTIP), and board of trustees of NEXA – Centre for Internet and Society, Politecnico di Torino. He has authored a monograph on the genealogy of copyright in Italy (La manifattura del pensiero, Milan: 2003) and edited a book on digital copyright (Proprietà digitale, Milan: 2005, with Maria Lillà Montagnani). He has extensively published on the topics of philosophy, copyright law and new media.
A light lunch will be served.
Sponsored by the Microsoft Law and Information Society Project
For more workshop information, please contact Nadia Gulezko at n.gulezko@utoronto.ca.
