David Bollier

Imagine if blues great B.B. King were able to prevent other artists from imitating his signature riffs, or Einstein's estate could prevent scientists from using E=MC² without first getting permission or paying a royalty. The blues would languish as an art form. Theoretical physics would remain stuck in the 19th Century.

It sounds silly, but that's more or less what Senator Charles Schumer is proposing we do for clothing design – lock it up as private property. A few days ago, he announced legislation that would for the first time in history extend copyright protection to fashion. The bill may earn Senator Schumer some brownie points among the high-fashion businesses in New York City, but for the fashion industry as a whole – and for consumers – the idea is a disaster.

Copyright protection for clothing would shut down the robust competition and creativity that allows this great global industry to develop new ideas and trends. Big-name fashion houses could monopolize a design, and then sic their lawyers on competitors who dared to do what they have always done – produce "substantially similar" shirts, trousers and jackets.

Citing instances of "piracy" assembled by Council of Fashion Designers of America, Senator Schumer criticized the look-alike items of clothing as "stealing, plain and simple."

Actually, there's another name for such activity – a trend – and it is the economic heartbeat of the industry. Prohibit copying and derivations in fashion, and you are essentially outlawing the economic benefits of trends. Does it bear mentioning that fashion is based on trends?

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Johanna Blakley

We've heard plenty about mysterious accounting practices in the film industry so I was very curious to hear what the suits have to say about financing films at the American Film Market. For an avid moviegoer and cultural critic like myself, going to the AFM Finance Conference is like glimpsing Oz behind the curtain. Who, pray tell, decided Sahara was worth $130 million? What sort of metrics were responsible for green-lighting Gigli, I Know Who Killed Me, or, the gold-standard for box-office failure, The Adventures of Pluto Nash? And why do so many crappy movies clog the screens at my local theaters -- even during “Oscar season"?

It became clear, quite quickly, that there is some method to the apparent madness -- and some reasons why we got stuck with Saw IV. Here are lessons I learned about how suits determine the value of a film and how battle-hardened executives cut corners:

How much is a film worth? Maybe you thought it had something to do with the stars, the director, the genre, the budget. Think again.

Marty Kaplan

Are Americans’ entertainment tastes as polarized as our political views? The Norman Lear Center teamed up with pollster John Zogby to find out. Get all the details.

Our findings, hot off the press, may give candidates some ideas about where to advertise. But the big picture is especially interesting. It turns out that – just as there are conservatives, liberals and moderates – there are people with red, blue and purple taste.

People with red taste think a lot of entertainment programming is in bad taste and doesn’t reflect their values. They think that fictional TV shows and movies are politically biased. They don’t like a lot of things on TV, but their two favorite channels are Fox and Fox News. They like sports, especially football and auto racing, and they watch news and business programming. They don’t like most contemporary music, and they don’t watch VH1 or MTV. They don’t much like late-night TV. They like to go to sporting events, and when they do go to the movies, which is rarely, they seek out action-adventure films. They’re not big book readers, but when they do read, they prefer non-fiction. When they read fiction, they often select mysteries and thrillers. They’re more likely to listen to country and gospel than other people, but their favorite music is classical. They don’t play a lot of video games, but when they do, Madden NFL and Mario are their favorites.