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Have We Misunderstood Copyright?

Stan J. Liebowitz

Journal of Economics & Management Strategy2026https://doi.org/10.1111/jems.70022article
AJG 2ABDC A
Weight
0.50

What the paper says

This paper uses a quasi‐experimental design, a unique dataset of physical books, and a sample of vintage former bestsellers to examine copyright's impact on price, sales, and availability in the book market. We find that copyright increases sales, raises price, especially for top‐selling titles, and increases the number of old titles being sold in the market. These findings challenge the traditional access/incentive tradeoff and the view that society benefits when titles enter the public domain. Policy implications include reconsideration of uniform copyright terms and exploration of renewal‐based systems that allow rights holders to self‐select into extended protection.

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https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1111/jems.70022

Or copy a formatted citation

@article{stan2026,
  title        = {{Have We Misunderstood Copyright?}},
  author       = {Stan J. Liebowitz},
  journal      = {Journal of Economics & Management Strategy},
  year         = {2026},
  doi          = {https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1111/jems.70022},
}

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Evidence weight

0.50

Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40

F · citation impact0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20
M · momentum0.50 × 0.15 = 0.07
V · venue signal0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03
R · text relevance †0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20

† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.