November 19, 2012 12:02PM # Where Should Libertarians and Conservatives Be on Copyright? (Event 12/6) By [Jim Harper](https://www.cato.org/people/jim-harper) --- SHARE Last week, an influential House Republican group made a feint toward supporting revamp of copyright law. On Friday, the Republican Study Committee [issued a paper](http://pastebin.com/RgsCu0Yr) harshly criticizing copyright law as it stands today and calling for a variety of reforms. Then it quickly retracted the paper. On Saturday, the paper came down from the RSC site, and RSC Executive Director Paul Teller issued a statement saying that the paper had been issued “without adequate review.” Today, it’s hard to find a source on the tech policy beat that isn’t writing about it: [Politico](http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1112/84018.html?hp=r5), [Hillicon Valley](http://thehill.com/blogs/hillicon-valley/technology/268671-rscs-removal-of-controversial-copyright-policy-brief-sparks-outcry-), [C|Net](http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57551614-38/gop-flip-flops-over-supporting-digital-copyright-reforms/), [TechDirt](http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20121116/16481921080/house-republicans-copyright-law-destroys-markets-its-time-real-reform.shtml), [Ars Technica](http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/11/influential-gop-group-releases-shockingly-sensible-copyright-memo/), and [TechCrunch](http://techcrunch.com/2012/11/18/corruption-or-carelessness-gop-deletes-their-own-progressive-patent-reform-report/), for example. The American Conservative was on the story early, coming out with a [highly laudatory comments](http://www.theamericanconservative.com/an-anti-ip-turn-for-the-gop/) on the RSC policy brief. That was the beginning of the conversation. It continues on Thursday, December 6th when we’ll be [hosting a book forum on the topic of copyright](https://www.cato.org/event.php?eventid=9216) here at Cato. The Mercatus Center’s Jerry Brito has edited a volume the thesis of which is evident in the title: *Copyright Unbalanced: From Incentive to Excess*. In addition to Brito, contributor (and Cato alum) Tom W. Bell will speak. And we’ll have able response and counterpoint given by Mitch Glazier, Senior Executive Vice President at the Recording Industry Association of America. Jerry Brito has written more about the book in a [Tech Liberation Front blog post](http://techliberation.com/2012/11/19/forthcoming-book-on-conservative-and-libertarian-skepticism-about-our-copyright-system/) this morning. Our book forum is on December 6th here at Cato. [Register now](https://www.cato.org/event.php?eventid=9216). ##### Related Tags [General](https://www.cato.org/general), [Technology and Privacy](https://www.cato.org/technology-privacy) [![Creative Commons License](/build/cato_2020/images/creative-commons.svg)](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/).