Phoenix Trap Mentioned on Lessig Blog

Stanford University’s Lawrence Lessig mentioned The Phoenix Trap in his blog today in reference to MP3.com’s continued failure. I’ve certainly critized them in the past. Now they’re refusing to cooperate with an increasingly popular and innovative licensing movement called Creative Commons.

I can?t describe how depressing this sort of stuff is. There are many in the content community who understood right away the benefits and virtues of Creative Commons licenses. Indeed, at our announcement in December, we had a video endorsement from not only John Perry Barlow but also Jack Valenti.

But we?ve obviously not yet made the mission clear enough ? at least if this is the sort of response we get from a company like mp3.com. Mp3.com was, in its birth at least, one of the most innovative digital music companies out there. Artists were free to sign with mp3.com without promising exclusivity. The company did a great deal to enable a wide and diverse base of creators, who could produce new music and sell it on the site. Tied with the fantastic eMusic.com site (which enables unlimited downloads of real mp3s for a flat monthly fee), the potential for this group of companies to help build a revolution in the creation and distribution of content is unlimited.

Read the rest here.
Lawrence Lessig argued the Eldred vs Ashcroft case in front of the Supreme Court this year. He’s known around the world as an expert on the Internet and its impact on intellectual property law. The Phoenix Trap are from Philadelphia and their bass player, Mark, will probably say something about it on his blog (or maybe here) today.