The emergence of new digital environments and low cost methods of replication and proliferation have transformed contemporary media experiences. Millions of people now have access to some form of communication technology, resulting in serious social conflicts around property rights over films and music in digital formats. Further, the emerging interface between communications technology and software is being registered at the ground level more than ever before: the entire VCD and Mp3 copy industry is software driven. On the one hand, if cheap copy culture has broadened people's access to communication and media forms, the new TRIPS based international legal regime seeks to restrict and regulate access by stronger laws an increased enforcement with dramatic raids and high profile court cases.

ALF and Sarai have come together on a cross-disciplinary collaborative research project "Intellectual property and the Knowledge/ Culture Common" in March 2002. Despite our diverse backgrounds, we recognize the central role that intellectual property laws play in the globalised 'knowledge economy', and that in the near future intellectual property will be one of the most significant sites of conflict over the production and control of knowledge and culture. more...