Wednesday, February 01, 2006

Oppose drm and get fired

Inga Chernyak, a legal clerk with a New York law firm, as well as president of the New York chapter of the Free Culture movement, has apparently been fired for expressing her distaste for drm.

"On January 10th 2006, the Village Voice ran an article called Code Warriors, detailing the efforts of the Free Culture movement, and those of the NYU chapter in particular. The reporter, Carla Blumenkranz, quoted FC co-founder Fred Benenson explaining that our efforts are about “harm reduction”; she noted, quite aptly, that our mission is to aid in “minimizing penalties and maximizing opportunities, for artists and audiences alike.” But what about the muckrakers? The conscientious objectors? The free culture activists? What protection from penalty do we have? What opportunity?

On Thursday, January 26th, I was fired from my job as a legal clerk at a medium sized IP law firm in midtown, NYC. When I inquired as to the reason, I was shown the Code Warriors article and told that my views about what the firm does were incompatible with…what the firm does. In so many words, I was told that the firm could no longer employ me due to my aberrant views on copyright law—although I was feverishly reassured of my right to hold those views. This assurance had relatively little value, however, as I was still fired for expressing the views in question. "

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