Putting Humpty Dumpty Back Together: Pricing in Anticommons Property Arrangements

Recently, a new theory has drawn considerable attention in the literature on common property. A number of scholars have pointed to the danger of excessive propertization in the context of what are termed anticommons property regimes. Although this theory has found its way into numerous legal and economic applications, the empirical and cognitive foundations of the theory of fragmentation remain unexplored. Based on experimental data, this Article conducts an investigation into the social and personal processes involved in the anticommons. The results confirm the theoretical proposition that anticommons deadweight losses increase with the degree of complementarity between individual parts and with the degree of fragmentation. Our study also provides three novel insights into the problem of fragmentation. First, the data illustrate that individual right holders base their reservation price on a proportion of the expected surplus of the bundler-purchaser, disregarding the objective value of the resource. Second, the experiments suggest that uncertainty amplifies the anticommons pricing effect. Individual right holders ignore the expected value of the purchaser’s project, and instead focus on the upper range of profitability and surplus. Willingness to accept is anchored onto a proportion of the maximum profitability, rather than a proportion of the expected benefits of the project. Finally, throughout the experiment reservation prices seem to be consistently lower in cases where there exists large uncertainty within the range of positive outcomes, relative to scenarios where there is relative certainty regarding a positive outcome but which includes the possibility of a (modest) negative outcome. Subjects seem to emphasize the relative low probability of success over the possibility of a negative outcome. The experiment provides clear indications of the pricing effect in settings where complementary units are fragmented over individual right holders. Given the stickiness of initial selling prices, and the prospective costs of the required negotiations to drive prices down to the expected value of the project, value maximizing projects might be abandoned, leading to the tragic outcome of under use or idleness. The results thus reinforce the normative hypothesis of the anticommons: property right systems should be careful in allowing the liberal creation and fragmentation of property rights

Copyright Backlash

In the past decade the entertainment industry has waged a legally very successful campaign against online copyright infringements. In a series of high profile decisions, content industries persuaded courts to accept expansive interpretations of contributory enforcement, to create novel doctrines of copyright infringement, and to apply broad interpretations of statutory damage provisions. Many private file-sharers, technology companies, university administrators and Internet service providers have felt the reach of this litigation effort. Yet a significant empirical anomaly exists: even as the copyright industry has ramped up the level of deterrence, online copyright infringements continue unabated. Why has the legal battle against file-sharers been so ineffective? The most straightforward explanation is that infringers are not deterred, either because the probability of getting caught remains remote or because the sanctions are not sufficiently salient. If that is the case, the expansive statutory damage award remedies in recent decisions such as Capitol Records v. Thomas-Rasset and Sony BMG v. Tenebaum, carry renewed promise for the entertainment industry. In this Article we claim that this deterrence-based approach will prove futile and even counterproductive to the goals of copyright holders. We argue that copyright law faces conditions similar to Prohibition and other historical episodes of enforcement failure. When infringements are widespread, effective deterrence cannot be attained without raising enforcement to levels that undermine the support for the underlying rules. As a result, enforcement has the inadvertent effect of moving behavior in the opposite direction from that intended by the law. In the context of copyright law, enforcement has increased the gap between the social and legal perceptions of copyright law. Because file sharers, as a group, perceive copyright litigation as excessive, this inadvertently strengthens opposition to the legally protected interests of copyright law. To further our understanding of the interplay between enforcement and public attitudes, we conduct two empirical studies on norms and copyright law. The results confirm that copyright enforcement is a double-edged sword. While stringent sanctions have a modest deterrent effect on file-sharing behavior, they increase anti-copyright sentiments among frequent offenders. This raises a spectacular challenge for copyright enforcement-the more copyright owners push to step up sanctions for copyright infringements; the more the public resents the protected rights. Consequently, stepping up sanctions tends to increase—rather than decrease—the rate and frequency of infringing activities. Our key results suggest therefore, that more stringent copyright enforcement will further erode respect for copyrights and may prove counterproductive to copyright owners

The Case Against Copyright Litigation

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Reduction of rectal toxicity in prostate cancer radiation therapy by implantable rectum spacers

This dissertation examines how to minimise gastrointestinal side effects of external prostate cancer radiation therapy by using a rectum spacer (a balloon that shifts the rectum away from the prostate). The rectum spacer is used to increase the space between rectum and prostate, therefore pushing the rectum out of the irradiated area. As a result, patients with prostate cancer suffer less gastrointestinal irritation, including symptoms of diarrhoea, constipation, mucous secretion, cramps and increased frequency of defaecation, faecal urgency or faecal incontinence. Various aspects of the rectum spacer were studied: cost-effectiveness, planning studies (comparative treatments with and without rectum spacer), selection of patients who may benefit most from this method, and the first implants in patients with prostate cancer and Crohn’s disease. Finally, we examined the personalisation of radiation doses by implanting a rectum spacer, i.e. safely increasing radiation doses with a higher chance of cure but without producing more side effects