Cyber-law Expert Lawrence Lessig to Speak at RIT, March 24

One of the world’s foremost experts in the field of cyber-law, Lawrence Lessig, will speak at Rochester Institute of Technology from 9 to 11 a.m. Friday, March 24. This special event, free and open to the public, will take place in the new Gordon Field House on the RIT campus.

Lessig, a professor of law at Stanford University, is widely known for his work on intellectual property and the limitations of copyright in the digital age. He has been a central voice in steering public discourse towards recognizing the restrictions being imposed upon cyberspace. He argued against the constitutionality of the 1998 Copyright Extension Act in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.

An advocate for access and collaboration, Lessig has led a campaign to inform the public that the Internet in not inherently free. Besides serving on the boards of the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Software Freedom Law Center, Lessig is the founder and chairman of Creative Commons, a non-profit organization devoted to expanding the range of creative work available for others to legally build upon and share. He has spearheaded the Creative Commons Foundation, which allows creators and users to quickly, efficiently and legally license and exchange intellectual work.

Lessig is the author of Free Culture (2004), The Future of Ideas (2001) and Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace (1999). He has won numerous awards, including the Free Software Foundation’s Freedom Award, and was named one of Scientific American’s Top 50 Visionaries.

More information on Lessig can be found on his website, www.lessig.org, or at www.rochester.freeculture.org.