Legal Commentary

McCain/Palin seeks "special rules"?

By Lawrence Lessig

Chris Soghoian of Berkman has a nice post about McCain/Palin's call on YouTube to review takedowns from campaigns before taking them down. He criticizes it as "special rules."

True enough, it is a special rule. But isn't it appropriate? For here's the new game for politics in the YouTube age: complain enough to get an account shut down (according to YouTube testimony, 3 complaints gets an account shut down (pg 17 near the bottom), and ideally, do it at the critical time just before an election.

Of course, no one should be subject to this arbitrary game. But especially a campaign. Let's start here and begin to build out from a clear example of bad incentives.

Full post as published by Lessig Blog on October 15, 2008 (boomark / email).