From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Permission culture is a term often employed by Lawrence Lessig and other copyright activists to describe a society in which copyright restrictions are pervasive and enforced to the extent that any and all uses of copyrighted works need to be explicitly leased. This has both economic and social implications: in such a society, copyright holders could require payment for each use of a work and, perhaps more importantly, permission to make any sort of derivative work.

Permission culture also refers to the mentality (assumed to be encouraged by copyright law) in which people feel that there is a moral obligation to ask for permission before sharing others' work, or before re-using existing work as part of some new work.

This term is often contrasted with remix culture.

External links

• Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig
• The Tyranny of Copyright? from the New York Times