The National Academies Board on Science, Technology and Economic Policy  (STEP)  has just issued a report titled "Copyright in the Digital Era: Building Evidence for Policy". I've not yet read the full report, but based on the summary one area that it highlights is the continuing lack of empirical data to help inform policymaking in this area. (I cannot resist noting that I served on a related study some years ago that produced a report titled "the Digital Dilemma"; that committee, too, was struck by the glaring lack of real evidence to support copyright related policy development; this is a very long-standing problem. It would be wonderful to see some real progress here, and I hope that this new report will help to focus thinking about collecting such data. )

Information on the report (which is available for free downloading) can be found at:

http://sites.nationalacademies.org/PGA/step/copyrightpolicy/

the report itself is here

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=14686

Clifford Lynch
Director, CNI