Public Citizen on "The Right of Publicity"
Here's a link to Public Citizen's Consumer Law and Policy Blog. This blog always has a lot of good stuff for those interested in consumer issues. Specifically, this blog covers one issue that isn't ordinarily thought of as a consumer issue, or even as a free-speech issue but it is. Paul Alan Levy of Public Citizen has written repeatedly in the blog condemning a modern trend to expand the Right of Publicity indefinitely. This is being done on a state-by-state basis, and it seems to fly in the face of the explicit text of Article 1, Section 8 of the United States Constitution's which explicitly grants Congress the right to grant protection to the works of authors and inventors for a limited time.
The current controversy is over the commercial use of the image of Barrack Obama. I don't think the founding fathers would have agreed with the notion that George Washington could demand royalties and censure any image of him in the marketplace. I don't think we should allow such a policy today.
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