Thinkingman's Dead

Steve Gimbel over at Philosophers' Playground has a new edited collection out, The Grateful Dead and Philosophy. In addition to just being way cool, the book also has an essay on the Dead, taping, digital commodities, and intellectual property rights. I'm going to have to get a copy soon.

the question about the relation between authorship and ownership -- which is quite similar to a discussion between Dead guitarist Bob Weir and Dead lyricist and Weir's longtime friend (and partner in crime back in their boarding school days) John Perry Barlow. Barlow has gone on to found the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an organization dedicated to protecting on-line access to information. One of the revolutions fomented by the Dead was their approach to intellectual property and McDaniel College philosopher Peter Bradley has a wonderful essay in the book discussing the Dead tapers' ethic and considering whether it should be used as the basis for a new approach to intellectual property.