The Microsoft Case Shortly after Microsoft was faced with federal antitrust charges, full-page newspaper ads supporting Microsoft's claim of innocence were run by the Independent Institute. The ads took the form of a letter signed by 240 academic experts and purported to be a scholarly, unbiased view of why the government had gone overboard in its case against the company. According to an article published in the New York Times, Microsoft had not paid for the ads, but was in fact the single largest donor to the Independent Institute, a conservative organization, that has been a leading defender of the company since it first came under fire from federal prosecutors.

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DMCA The DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) was signed into law by U.S. President Clinton in 1998 and implements the two 1996 WIPO treaties (WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty and WIPO Copyright Treaty). Besides other issues the DMCA addresses the influence of new technologies on traditional copyright. Of special interest in the context of the digitalization of intellectual property are the titles no. 2, which refers to the limitation on the liability of online service providers for copyright infringement (when certain conditions are met), no. 3, that creates an exemption for making a copy of a computer program in case of maintenance and repair, and no. 4 which is concerned with the status of libraries and webcasting. The DCMA has been widely criticized for giving copyright-holders even more power and damage the rights and freedom of consumers, technological innovation, and the free market for information.

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